CRIMSON
by
SHIRLEY CON RAN


Shirley Conran went to St.  Paul's Girls" School, London, which taught
her how to maximize time, followed by a finishing school in
Switzerland, which taught her how to waste time.  She then trained as a
painter and sculptor at Southern College of Art, Portsmouth.  Until she
was thirty, she worked as a textile designer and colour consultant and
she has designed her own paint range.  She was one of the selection
committee for the Design Council for eight years.  She was the first
women's editor of the Observer colour magazine and a women's editor of
the Daily Mail, where she launched "Femail'.  She handled the publicity
for the "Women in Media" campaign for legislation against sex
discrimination.  She was formerly married to design tycoon Sir Terence
Conran and they have two sons, Sebastian and Jasper, both of whom art
designers; fashion designer Georgina Godley is her daughter-in-law.
Shirley Conran now lives in Monaco.

Shirley Conran has also published Superwoman 197; The Superwoman
Yearbook 1976; Superwoman in Action published in hardback as Superwoman
2, 1977; Futurewoman with Elizabeth Sidney, published in hardback as
Futures, 1979; Forever Superwoman 198 1; Down with Superwoman iggi, the
revised and updated edition of Superwoman; The Magic Garden 1983 for
beginner gardeners; and, for children, The Amazing Umbrella Shop iggo.
Penguin publish many of her books, including her best-selling novels
Lace, its sequel Lace 2, and Savages.

SHIRLEY CON RAN

CRIMSON

PENGUIN BOOKS

PENGUIN BOOKS

Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane,
London w8 5Tz, England Penguin Books USA Inc."  375 Hudson Street, New
York, New York 10014, USA Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood,
Victoria, Australia Penguin Books Canada Ltd, to Alcorn Avenue,
Toronto, Ontario, Canada m4v 3B2 Penguin Books NZ Ltd, 182-igo Wairau
Road, Auckland io, New Zealand Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:
Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England First published in the USA by Simon
Schuster Inc.  1992 First published in Great Britain by Sidgwick
Jackson Ltd 1992 Published in Penguin Books 1992 13 5 7 9 jo 8 6 4 2
Copyright D Shirley Conran, 1992

All rights reserved The moral right of the author has been asserted
Printed in England by Clays Ltd, St.  Ives pic Set in 9112 pt Monophoto
Times Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject
to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be
lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the
publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover than that in
which it is published and without a similar condition including this
condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser For my very dear
friend Jennifer dAbo What women want in life is love and what men want
is power and men want power as much as women want love: women think
that they don't understand what power is, but in the nursery, power is
called getting your own way.

From A Burning Heart by Elinor Dove

CHAPTER I

MONDAY,5JULYi965 Within the Chiteau de Saracen, cream blinds had been
lowered in the main bedroom, but the glare of the July sun reflected
from the Mediterranean Sea below could still be felt by the gaunt,
white-clad nurse as she rustled from the bathroom with a small tray.
She had a sallow face; beneath her sunken eyes were dark, liverish
pouches.

As the church clock struck the noon hour, the nurse checked her watch;
with an angular, careful walk on legs as thin as breadsticks, she
approached the bed.  The magnificent eight-foot-wide four-poster had
once been the property of a Spanish princess; the high canopy was
surmounted by ostrich feathers made of beaten silver; the hangings were
stiff with cream brocade; and the interior of the curtains was heavily
embroidered in gold, with a design of lilies.  This ornate silver pile
only escaped vulgarity because the other furniture in the room was
simple and sparse.

They'll probably be squabbling over that bed by tomorrow, thought the
nurse, although it's beginning to look as if the old girl might last
another few days.  So far, her three granddaughters had only been
anxious and concerned about her, but once they knew that she was going,
then the fun would start!  Confusion always built up as the end
approached.  The cross-currents of emotion and the momentary paralysis
of shock were followed by the whispered anxieties and accusations; then
came the little plots; and after that, the squabbles and the mighty,
roaring rows.

Yes, thought the nurse, when it came to money, blood was thinner than
water.  Her experience had been that every family was a seething
cauldron of violent feelings: beneath the surface of the stew simmered
expectations and demands, disappointment and suspicion, evasion of
responsibility, greed and fear.  And a deathbed was frequently the
setting in which this stew of potential violence came to an explosive
boil.

An unusual amount of money, such as this old girl clearly had, was
especially tempting and therefore especially destructive in its
volatile ability to draw bad or weak family characteristics to the
surface.

The nurse carefully placed her tray on the bedside table and picked up
the syringe.  As always, she wondered what people might be tempted to
do for a fortune.  Anything, provided they weren't discovered, she
decided as she flicked the syringe to expel air, preparatory to
injecting the medicine into the thin arm of the feeble figure that lay
in the bed.

The nurse spoke a little English but could not follow these foreigners
when they talked among themselves.  She didn't need to, however; she
knew with certainty what had drawn them here: they had sniffed money
and followed the scent of the sous here to her part of Fiance.  Now
that they were here, she knew they would return.  For once they have
heard it, the siren call of the south of France will always beckon
visitors back to the timeless, sensuous landscape; back to the sun, to'
the sharp, exhilarating intensity of the light; to the sea and the
pine-scented air; to the delicious food, the delicate, seductive
wine.

Luckily, the foreign tourists of July and August were usually seen only
in the well-publicized resorts and rarely found the tiny, quiet
villages along that sun-drenched coastal strip known as the Cote
d'Azur.  Saracen was exactly such a place: built on a hilltop that
plunged three hundred feet to the sea on the southern side, the
medieval, tan-roofed village was dominated by this eleventh-century
stone chAteau, firmly perched on its truncated summit.

The nurse picked up her tray and returned it to the bathroom.  She
lingered at the window, looking out at the spectacular view.  On both
sides of Saracen, cedar- and pine-covered mountains descended directly
to the deep aquamarine sea.  As she leaned out, the nurse could also
see behind the village, to the north, the perpetually green forest of
the hinterland, which still provided shelter for wild boar, rabbits,
and birds.

Down below the castle, the stone arches and narrow roads shimmered in
the heat; leaves drooped from plane trees and dogs panted beneath them.
Windows were shuttered against the burning glare of the midday sun,
which sapped all energy from the " day and everyone in it.  Not a
single villager would be visible until four o'clock.  The voluptuous
summer heat of the Riviera was enjoyable only if you did not need to
work in it, so by tradition, nobody did.

The nurse yawned, and wished that she, too, could take a siesta.  She
knew that during this long, somnolent afternoon, most inhabitants of
Saracen would stay indoors in shuttered shade to doze, to make love, or
simply to enjoy their temporary, midday withdrawal from real life.  It
was a tempting prospect.  Then, when the church clock chimed four, the
villagers would open their shutters, stretch their arms, call greetings
to one another from their black, curlicued wrought-iron balconies, and
generally behave as if, like Sleeping Beauty, they had just awakened
from a slumber that had lasted one hundred years.

The nurse yawned again.  Unfortunately, she could not sleep now.  She
had to sit with the old woman; that was what she was paid to do.  She
walked towards the still Agure in the ornate bed.

Abruptly the nurse stopped, startled, as her patient stirred slightly,
then moaned.

Lying in her silver bed, Elinor O'Mre surged i and out of
consciousness, suspended in a sea of incoherence.

For what seemed a long time, a black void of fear and pain had been
Elinor's only reality.  Disoriented, she no longer knew in which
direction the sky lay.  She now felt sick and giddy, as if she were
seasick, as if she were being tossed around by a monstrous wave. Elinor
sensed that should she move, the steel band around her head would
tighten like a tourniquet, increasing the ruthless pain.

Long ago, during the First World War, when Elinor had nursed 'dying
men, she had at first been terrified by the noise of their pain, by the
ululating groans and sharp screams that rose from their blood-soaked
stretchers and their sweat-drenched beds.  Even now she could recall
the sweet, putrid smell of death; she also remembered the fear that had
blanketed those wards, and now felt it herself, as pain wrapped her
body in a formless black haze.

Was she dying?  The thought was light as an autumn leaf, floating in
her mind.  Vaguely Elinor reasoned that if that were so, then the pain
would cease and nothing else really mattered.  Gradually, however, the
waves of pain seemed to lessen, to lose their anger.  She sensed a
coming calm.  Dare she hope that the pain was receding, or would that
tempt the dark gods to increase it?  No, there Was no longer any doubt.
The pain was slowly but-definitely withdrawing from her body.

Eventually Elinor knew the almost forgotten luxury of no pain.  Little
by little her body relaxed, but still she dared not move, for fear of
again inviting those searing stabs of agony.  Elinor, who felt as if
she had been holding her breath for hours, tentatively tried to take a
deep breath.

Immediately a thousand needles jabbed her ribs.  Her instinct was to
scream, but she was unable to make even a sound.  Something hard and
smooth was clamped over her face, she realized with a shock, and her
head was constricted by a contraption she could not see.

I Though Elinor did not yet try to move, she could listen and she could
smell.  Concentrating, she could make out the faint, steady lapping of
the sea against the rocks below her window; intuitively she sensed the
sun's warmth and smelled the Provenal scent of summer.

Suddenly she knew where she was!  She was in her own bed at Saracen, on
a warm summer's day.  She could smell the soft breeze that blew off the
hinterland, wafting rosemary, thyme, and the hot-bake dearth smell of
the mountains.

Lying in her bed, Elinor decided that she must have had a nightmare,
one of those terrible visions with the lingering power to convince,
even after she had awakened.  Better open her eyes now and ring for
breakfast, she thought.  Her bowl of milky coffee, her croissants and
fruit, with the morning papers and mail would put her world in order
again.

At first her eyelids seemed too heavy to lift; but slowly and with
great effort, Elinor opened them a little, gradually registering the
soft golden glow of filtered sunlight.

Yes.  Everything was as usual.  Before her, above the fireplace, hung a
large, elaborately framed picture, which had been painted eight years
ago, in 1957.  In the life-size portrait, three girls dressed in white
ball gowns sat on a misty blue brocade sofa in a shadowy drawing room.
You did not have to be told that these girls were sisters: they shared
a happy complicity, and although their colouring differed, they all had
the same small, neat nose and large, slanting, aquamarine eyes.

From the left, eighteen-year-old Clare, dark and tiny, leaned forward
with a serious expression, offering a rose to tawny-haired Annabel,
unquestionably the family beauty.  Miranda sixteen, skinny, still at
school perched like a bird on the back of the sofa; her face was pale
and she hadn't yet dyed her beige hair that odd marmalade colour.

She appeared slightly withdrawn but as charming as the other two, and
as heedlessly ready to fly into life.

Only Annabel could be called a beauty, for Clare's expression was too
anxious and Miranda's features were a little too sharp.  All three,
however, reflected the charisma of breeding and privilege.  More
significant in Elinor's eyes, all, three reminded her of her dear
Billy.

The portrait always comforted Elinor.  She remembered satisfying
moments when the girls were small and she had taken a day off work and
was about to take them out' to tea or on a shopping trip: all three
children would be clean and neat socks still pulled up, hair ribbons
tied and almost quivering with eager anticipation.

Such moments of true happiness had been rare in Elinor's life and they
had never come when expected but blossomed quickly, at surprising
moments.  She had long ago decided that you couldn't plan happiness,
but you could plan achievement; and she had planned well, for she had
succeeded beyond all reasonable expectations.  In spite of all the
early setbacks, the treachery, disappointments, and sheer drudgery, her
success had been considerable: her twenty-two novels had been published
in some forty countries; her fan mail arrived weekly by the sackful;
and she received from everyone the respect that was her due.  The
legendary Elinor O'Dare was famous, successful, and very, very rich.

The legendary Elinor winced abruptly.  The burning pain had started
again, and it was within her body.  Lying inert in the heat of her
shaded bedroom, she realized that she could not move her limbs.  There
seemed to be no strength in her arms or legs: she willed her arms to
lift, and they did not do so.  She was paralysed.  She was not
dreaming.  She could not move!  She tried to speak, then to scream but
she couldn't.  Nor could she open her mouth.  Her head felt woolly and
muddled.  The thought slowly registered she must have uda stroke.  No!
It couldn't be!  She didn't-want it!  She hadn't yet finished living!

The effort of her anguished thinking exhausted her.  Her eyelids
fluttered shut, and black oblivion slowly drew over her.  She willed
her mind to go blank, yet somewhere outside her mental enclosure she
heard a sound.  It was the well remembered rustle of a nurse's starched
apron.  She smelled the hospital smell of ether and the sour whiff of
medicine.  I "Am, I dying?"  Elinor whispered in French, finally
willing her frozen mouth to move awkwardly.

"No.  Do not upset yourself."  The nurse's voice was calm, flat, and
disinterested.  Elinor knew she was lying.  Her first reaction was one
of indignation.  She was used to being in command of her life, used to
writing the plot herself as she did those of her best-selling novels.
But now she was rendered impotent by her helplessness at the mercy of
this mean-voiced nurse.  An invisible, inexorable pen was scribbling
"The End" before Elinor had finished her story and this time there
would be no happy ending.

For years Elinor had successfully avoided thinking about death.  Like
many strong-minded and successful people, she had not wanted to face
the fact that, one day, she would die.  She had not bothered to make a
will, for that would mean having to make unpleasant decisions,
decisions dealing with her own mortality.  So she had put it off,
resisting her lawyer's gentle, persistent urging, preferring to ignore
the subject, to think of herself only as enduring, invincible.

But today, lying in this shuttered room, she knew that the invincible
had met the inevitable.  She could only hope that she might have some
time to get things in order.  And she had better make her decisions
quickly or she might 'lose the chance to do so.

Elinor felt the uncomfortable contraption being tugged from her face.
She felt too tired to move, to think, or to complain; she felt
helpless and at the mercy of this impersonal stranger.  Obviously,
death was going to be a humiliating business, and she knew that
helplessness was only the start.

Hearing the sharp, efficient moves of the nurse around her bed, Elinor
fleetingly remembered daydreams from many years ago from 1917, after
she had left the small family farm near Excelsior, Minnesota, to train
as an auxiliary nursing aide.  She was only seventeen, still idealistic
and romantic enough to envisage herself as a calm, reassuring angel of
mercy.  The First World War had inspired many young women to volunteer
for auxiliary service of some kind; for most, it was a first step away
from home.  For most, it was also an abrupt end to innocence.

Elinor remembered her own reaction when she first arrived at the
casualty clearing station in northern France to which she had been
posted.  She had expected the quiet orderly calm of the wards at her
training hospital, not that shocking, awful noise in Ward C: the
animal-like whimpers, sobs, sharp shrieks of agony, men crying in
loose-mouthed delirium, while a phonograph played a Bing Boys" tune to
comfort those who knew they were about to die.

Now, almost half a century later, realizing what little time remained
to her, Elinor's patience vanished as instantaneously as had her
innocence.  Lying there, trapped in her bed, she found to her surprise,
however, that it wasn't the physical act of dying that she minded, or
leaving what she had fought so hard to achieve.  But the girls still
needed -her; they needed her strength, her advice, her emotional and
moral support: despite the fact that two of them were married women and
the, third had already established a thriving business, Elinor was
convinced that the girls could not yet survive without her.  Her
fortune, of course, would ensure their comfort and their social
prestige, but who would be there to advise and protect them?

Elinor had been able to give her granddaughters what she had not had,
and what she had been unable to give her only son, Edward: a life
virtually free from care; a life in which there was the time and
opportunity to look for happiness and, should they find it, simply to
enjoy it; a life untroubled by the financial anxiety with which Elinor
had lived for the first forty-five years of her life.  It was an
anxiety that had faded only when thanks to her darling Billy she had
been able to grasp success and to savour its rewards.

At the thought of Billy, Elinor's eyelids slowly lifted.  In the dim
light, she could just make out the small group of Over-framed
photographs on her bedside table.  Once again Elinor gazed into the
smiling, confident eyes of the fairhaired young man she had loved so
much.  There he stood, flying goggles pushed back on his head, hands
thrust in the bottom pockets of a battered tunic; his plane, a
primitive machine made of canvas and struts, was behind him.

Billy O'Dare had been one of the few men to survive Ward C. His
navigator had pulled him, unconscious, from his shot-down plane before
it burst into flames.  Billy had suffered a concussion, a slight cut on
his head, and a bullet through his left foot that fractured the
calcaneum.

Nearly fifty years later, Elinor still happily remembered the evening
she fell in love with Billy O'Dare.  The war was relatively quiet when,
shortly after midnight, she heard Aoking cries from bed 17.  Grabbing
the lantern, she hur2-1tied to find out what was wrong.  Gently she
shook the young man awake he'd had a bad dream, that was all.  "Fliaht
Commander O'Dare continued to sob, however, now clinging to Elinor's
hand.  His face was partly covered ky.  a turban like bandage, but her
lantern shone into his eyes, reducing the pupils to pinpoints of black
against irises of an unusual, dazzling shade of aquamarine.  Elinor
thought she had never seen anything so beautiful.

-Sorry to make such an ass of myself," he mumbled.  Don't worry.
"Plenty of patients have nightmares," Elinor comforted, trying to ease
her hand away.  She could smell, against the harsh wool of his blanket
and the antiseptic whiff of bandages, the pungent male perfume of his
body.  He was no longer sobbing now, and she knew she should move away.
Still, she could not stop staring into his eyes.

Patient 17 raised Elinor's hand to his lips and she felt the tickle of
his blond moustache against her thumb.  For a moment, she thought he
was going to kiss her hand, but instead, he turned it over and pressed
her palm to his mouth.  As Elinor felt the caress of his warm breath,
Billy O'Dare gently licked her hand.  She felt his moist tongue run
slowly over her flesh and knew again that she should move away; her
feet, however, seemed glued to the floorboards.  She felt a blush rise
from her breast and held her breath as he continued to stroke her hand
with his warm, catlike tongue.  Her trancelike state was broken only
when another patient suddenly screamed.

By morning, Nurse Elinor Dove knew patient 17's medical notes by heart.
She also knew-that Flight Commander William Montmorency O'Dare of the
British Royal Air Force was twenty-five years old.

By some odd form of osmosis, the entire ward seemed to know immediately
that Nurse Dove had tumbled in love with O'Dare.  Beneath Elinor's nun
like white headdress, her grape-green eyes glistened, and her cheeks
were even pinker than usual.  There was a lively spring in her step,
and Sister had to admonish her for singing to herself.

On a visit to Ward C, Billy's former navigator, Joe Grant, immediately
spotted the romance.  He told Billy he was a lucky dog, that Nurse Dove
was special, different from the rest, When Billy repeated this
observation to Elinor, she sniffed, "That's what you men say to all us
girls.  What's so different about meT Billy looked at her thoughtfully,
then said, "The girls at home are pale imitations of LIFE compared to
you.  You have such vitality, such get-up-and-go!  You have energy.
It's positively infectious!"  He hesitated.

"It is so American, it seems.  I've seen these qualities in your
soldiers as well; it's something you don't see in the Frenchies or
Tommies.  Whatever it is, you really are very special."  Looking up
from his pillow, Billy O'Dare hunched his right shoulder and slightly
bent his bandaged head towards it as he smiled gently at Nurse Dove. 
From that moment on, she was forever in his control.  Long after they
were married, when Elinor knew fully the true cost of love, the slow
grin that so clearly showed Billy's impudent Irish charm that complex
combination of innocence and artfulness would always wipe away her
anger in an instant.

All these years after their meeting, Elinor recalled that irresistible
grin; it was how she liked to remember Billy.  In fact, it had become
the only way she allowed herself to remember Billy as the smiling,
dashing young war hero who became her romantic bridegroom.  Any
subsequent unpleasant memories had been hidden in some dusty corner of
her mind.

It was a pity that colour photography hadn't been invented then, she
thought as she stared at the silver-framed, sepia photograph.  All
three sisters had inherited Billy's aquamarine eyes, although only
Miranda had inherited the beguiling grin.  From Elinor they had
inherited ... Elinor was suddenly reminded again that she hadn't made a
will.  Their inheritance: yes, there was that to deal with.  She closed
her eyes, then, with an effort of will, opened them again.  Slowly the
room settled into focus.

The nurse leaned over her patient, "Can you open your mouth, madame?
... A little more .. ."  From a spouted cup, she dribbled a few drops
of water into Elinor's mouth; then she carefully rubbed ointment over
the dry lips.

Painfully, Elinor whispered, "Where ... are ... my granddaughter sT
She couldn't move the right -side of her face, so she spoke slowly and
awkwardly, slurring her words as if tipsy.  She could move her right
fingers and toes, but she could not feel those on her left side.

Feeling panic start to rise, Elinor remembered that when she was very
young and woke at night, she used to clutch her rogary to keep the
devil at bay; now she groped for something similarly comforting to
reassure her.  More urgently she croaked, "Where are my
granddaughters?"

"I believe the ladies are on the terrace.  I will call them."

The nurse went to the window and pulled back the shutters.  Yes, there
they were, typically heedless of the afternoon sun.  She called down.

From her bed, Elinor could hear excited voices, then the sound of metal
chairs scraping against earthenware tiles.  Tremulously she smiled,
struggling to adjust her eyes to the sudden infusion of light.

A few minutes later, her bedroom door was flung open.  Elinor first saw
Clare's animated, pale face, framed by long, straight dark hair.

"Darling, we've been so worried."  Clare's voice was high and soft. She
rushed to the bedside, knelt down and kissed her grandmother's face,
then the thin, blue-veined hands.

"Don't overexcite her," warned the nurse.

"My turn, "said Annabel, whose long, honey-coloured hair was wet and
tangled after swimming.  For the past seven years, Annabel's lovely
face had gazed, wide-eyed, from every Avanti cosmetics advertisement
around the world.  When Elinor looked at her, she thought of white
Persian kittens, feather beds, and pale pink peonies: Annabel was soft,
voluptuous, and feminine.  Gently Annabel stroked her grandmother's
long, fair hair, now white at the roots, as it spread, fanlike, upon
the pillow.  She kissed the sunken cheeks and whispered, "Oh, Gran, we
thought we'd lost you."

Both sisters were close to tears as they gazed lovingly at d3their
grandmother.  Only Clare had even the slightest memory of their parents
killed in 1941 in a German bombing raid on London, and Elinor had
always been the centre of their world.  They couldn't imagine life
without her.  She had always seemed a combination of Isadora Duncan and
Elinor Glyn - a bold, dramatic, and immortal figure.

"Where's Miranda?"  Elinor whispered.

"She had to return to London for the day a business meeting," Clare
said softly.

"We've all been here for the last two weeks.  Annabel flew from New
York as soon as we heard you were ill, but it took me a bit longer to
get organized in Los Angeles.  Miranda's flying back tonight, by
helicopter."

"And where is Buzz?"

Buzz was Elinor's lifelong friend, now her secretary.

"Gone to Nice to get your medicine.  After that, she's calling at the
airport, to see if Annabel's luggage has turned up.  Buzz never gives
up hope!"

"We don't want to overexcite Madame before the doctor sees her."  The
nurse firmly held open the bedroom door.

"You must go now, and I will call him."

Annabel turned rebelliously towards the nurse, clearly prepared to
ignore the edict.

Clare, however, immediately became the anxious and responsible elder
sister.

"Don't be difficult, Frog," she coaxed, using the childhood nickname
that referred to Annabel's large and sensuous mouth.

"We'll be back as soon as they let us."  Clare gently pushed her sister
out of the bedroom.  Elinor turned imploring eyes towards the nurse.
Silently they said, please get a move on.  I have so much to do.
Elinor's indomitable spirit was reasserting itself.

Clare, wearing a white bikini, lay on a beach mattress by the pool.
She was small and skinny, but managed to look slim and fragile; she had
a fey, elusive charm: you felt that she might slip between your
fingers, like clear water from a mountain stream.

Lying on the next beach mattress, Annabel wore a claret-coloured silk
dressing gown that belonged to her husband.  She always carried this
item and a set of spare underwear in her hand luggage, for the rest of
her baggage seemed invariably to travel on without her.  This trip had
proved no exception.

When the poolside telephone rang, Annabel grabbed the ivory receiver.

"Maybe it's about my luggage.  If it's gone on a trip to eternity, the
airway will have to pay for all those new clothes."  She looked at the
buttons on the telephone, which also served as an intercom, and
frowned.

"I'll never get the hang of this thing."  She pressed a button.  The
line went dead.

"Hell, I'm hopeless with machinery."  Annabel noticed that Clare looked
anxious.

"Sorry, Clare.  Are you expecting a cal lT "Not really.  Well, perhaps
... I thought that Clare pushed dark strands of hair from her forehead.
She suddenly burst into tears, covering her face with her hands.

Annabel scrambled from her mattress and ran to her sister, embracing
her, pulling her close.

"What's up, darling?.  I knew something was wrong!  Otherwise you
wouldn't have lugged Josh and his nanny all the way from California.
Tell me.  Why hasn't he telephoned?"

Gradually Clare's sobbing subsided.  In a tone filled with angry
indignation, unlike her normal soft voice, she told Annabel of the row.
Clare had gone to the beach for the day, accompanied by Josh and his
nanny.  She returned early because of period cramps, and in her bedroom
she found a thin, tanned woman lying naked beside her husband.  A
bitter scene ensued.  Clare stormed to her dressing and started to
pack.  She heard his car spray gravel outside her window as it took
off, too fast.  Kneeling by her suitcase, Clare wept until another car
arrived and Josh and his nanny clattered, laughing, into the house.  At
that moment, Annabel had telephoned from New York.

"Then you told me about Gran's stroke," snuffled Clare.

"Poor darling," Annabel murmured, stroking Clare's long, dark hair.

"He's so clever at sidetracking.  He makes me look like an
overemotional idiot, when all the time he's in the wrong."  With the
back of her hand, Clare wiped tears away.  She had always told herself
that despite his casual promiscuity, her husband loved her in a special
way, that he would never abandon their real love or jeopardize their
son's happiness.  She told herself he was only asserting his male
prowess with those other women, and he wouldn't ever take one of them
seriously.  But then, that day, Clare had suddenly found that she could
bear no more humiliation.  So she had left him.

In the late-afternoon Provenqal sunshine, Annabel silently hugged Clare
and waited.

Eventually Clare continued, "I didn want the usual reconciliation
scene, the usual flowers, the usual promises and then the usual pain
next time.  Suddenly I simply didn't care what happened to him."  She
hugged her sister.

"Oh Annabel, you won't tell anyone, will you?"  "Have I ever told your
secrets?  But if you've really walked out for good, everyone will have
to know sometime.  Are you sure you're going to .. ."

"Get a divorce?  Yes.  Absolutely.  I don't want Josh growing up to be
like his father."

"Well, don't let Gran know, at least not yet.  You know it'll upset
her.  In fact, don't tell anyone until you're sure you're sure."

As Annabel comforted her sister, a maid approached.

Speaking in French, she said, "The pool telephone malfunctions.  New
York awaits Miss Annabel."

"I'll take it in my bedroom," Annabel said, jumping up with almost
childish enthusiasm.  She ran upstairs to her pale pink apartment,
which overlooked the cobbled entrance courtyard and the church beyond
it.

"Darling?  At last!  What's your new sT Annabel could hear background
sounds from the New York TV station for which her husband was a news
anchorman.  He was one of eleven reporters, only three of whom appeared
as on-air newscasters.

"Local or national, angel?  It's eleven in the morning and sticky hot
in New York.  Yesterday Martin Luther King called for an end to the
Vietnam War, but it looks as if Johnson will order more troops in.  My
lead story for this evening?.  Kennedy's original view of Vietnam as a
quick in-and-out operation might end in world war."  Annabel could
imagine his teasing smile.

"I hope your news is less alarming."

Annabel told her husband about Elinor's return to consciousness.

"That's wonderful, angel.  When are you coming back?"

"I don't know.  When Gran's better.  Does it mat terT Her husband
hesitated.

"Sidney wants to talk to us."

"Why?"  Sidney was their accountant, and the sound of his name
instantly set off alarm bells.

"I've decided to go after a better job."

Annabel could hear the lack of self-confidence in her husband's voice.
She said, "But you love your "It's a little earlier than I planned to
make my move, but that's not so terrible.  We're sinking deeper into
debt each day, and we have to find some way to shore up our
finances."

Annabel said miserably, "Oh darling, I'm so sorry.  I was the one who
insisted on the new duplex.  It never crossed my mind that Avanti might
not renew my contract."  She gave a shaky laugh-"I know I'm
twenty-five, but that's not old.  Not in the normal world.  Only for a
model."

"Avanti still might renew your contract.  We don't know."

"I wish they'd make their damned minds up," Annabel said.

"I could kick myself for buying that apartment!  I can't think why I
was so extravagant."  I I "You bought it to give me the right
background.  You said, "A good picture needs a good frame,"" he
reminded her.

"You said in order to get into the Mike Wallace league, I have to look
as if I am already in it."

"Absolutely.  And you will be."  Annabel cheered up.  Her husband had
the same quick, hard intelligence as Mike Wallace: he could be just as
probing and provoking when interviewing.  He could also produce the
sort of insistent question that turned a news interview into a
psychodrama.  And he had the voice.

"Darling," she went on, "you're one of the best newsmen on television.
And remember, you're only twenty-nine years old.  Mike Wallace was
thirty-eight before he got his break on Night Beat.  Plus I love
you."

"And I love you.  In the meantime, angel, don't take all the blame for
the apartment.  Remember, New York is a town about showing you can make
it, making it, and then showing you've made it.  Who knows, the
apartment may help land my new job."

Annabel laughed.

"Well, if you don't get your job and I don't get mine, we'll just have
to sell the place and rent, like the rest of New York.  It really
doesn't matter where we live.  We'll still have each other."  Strapped
into the noisy helicopter, Miranda tucked an unruly strand of
marmalade-coloured hair behind her intercom headset as she looked out
at the sullen, grey English

04ann el belawi "We left Lmdon at two-durtyso well get so: Saracen
by,seven,m sood time for dinner."  Miranda kept her voice as low as
possible, her tone steady and deliberate; she spoke that way because
she found that it commanded attention.  She pressed her face against
the tough plastic bubble that enveloped them.

"I do so wish that Gran would let me learn to fly.  Couldn't you
persuade her?"  Miranda then remembered that this might not be
necessary. It was so hard to reconcile herself to the reality of her
grandmother's illness.  She bit her lip and willed the tears away.

Sitting next to her, Adam Grant shook his head.  He was tall, dark, and
brown-eyed, with firm-hewn features and a cynical air of assurance.
Miranda thought he looked like one of those almost perfect men drawn in
magazine advertisements for cashmere sweaters, or that he might have
fallen from the pages of one of Gran's romantic novels.

Adam's father, Joe Grant, had been Elinor's longtime legal adviser and
close friend.  After his death, five years before, Elinor's business
affairs had gradually been passed to Adam, who also worked for the
family legal firm of Swithin, Timmins and Grant.

Adam had asked Miranda for a lift in' the Bell because this was one of
the rare occasions when all three sisters would be at Saracen.  Having
them together like this would provide him with the opportunity to
discuss, gently but firmly and as unemotionally as possible, what would
happen should Elinor die intestate.  Despite her dual US and British
citizenship, Elinor was resident in France, and the French tax
authorities considered theirs to be the controlling law for her entire
estate.  Once again Adam regretted that he had been unable to persuade
Elinor to make a will, because there were always complications when
anyone died intestate.  Perhaps he should have been more insistent,
"eed, partly because she had correctly Iso he had never before seen Mir
.  her emotions.

-nd kerchief from his navy "diranda gulped.

"Can the floored his faint 'it.  which edy 0 to VI know what you're
thinking.  You're think'-s Miranda burst into tears.  oug It steps Cd
Zran busin Last part-ti k sheet "You she did 0 interesti 5 ate as n 0
"Z was Ocs.  0 what of Looki thinking bodies w wasn't voluptuous, but
it was perfect: her breasts were small, high, and rounded; her waist
was neat, her stomach flat.  And when she walked, her long, slim legs
moved in a graceful stalk.  In addition, Miranda was always
appropriately dressed for the occasion: that grey silk suit, simple but
feminine, had been perfect for this morning's monthly office meeting.

Miranda shrugged her shoulders and decided to change the subject.  She
switched off the intercom to the pilot so that he couldn't hear what
she was saying.

"Adam, I'm not entirely happy about Ned Sinclair."

"I think he's settled down very fast."  Adam had poached their new
financial director from a rival cosmetics manufacturer.

"He asked me one or two unnecessary questions about our future plans.
It bothers me, although perhaps I've Channel below.

"We left London at two-thirty her beauty to Saracen by seven in good
time for kept her voice as low as possible, all shops."  Adam's
deliberate; she spoke that way bsh away an irritation.  commanded
attention.  She preAad been when he was at tough plastic bubble that er
flopped over his left temple that Gran would let me le IWfing,
seemingly innocent charm.  her?"  Apetition because we think along
Miranda then ren p4he'll be international before I am.  I sary.  It was
so hyrised to hear that Ned has approached grandmother away.  in it
occurred to Adam that Miranda had inSitti any of Elinor's
characteristics: her intuition and tall, ility to act on it, her
stubborn'determination, and c r guts.

He smiled.

"I'll run a check on Ned.  You could be international if only you would
agree to franchise."

"I won't franchise because I don't want to lose control of my business!
However tight the contracts are, you lose control once you do.  Others
might not want to work as hard as we do, and they may not have such
high standards of presentation.  So please forget it."

"If you won't franchise, then you'll have to put up with being short of
money," Adam said firmly, looking at her from large-lidded dark eyes.

"What would you do for a lot of money, Miranda?"

"What wouldn't I do for a lot of money!"  Miranda laughed.

"I wonder," Adam said thoughtfully.

"Oh, you're so resolute, so determined."  Miranda smiled.

"I can't think why we seem to be on an endless financial at thi e for
all shops sh away an away Si'ti ar tall, ility I c r guts.

TT,..  il,., tightrope."

"Because you want to expand faster than we can afford."  Adam spoke
laconically.  He shrugged his shoulders.

"But who knows what lies ahead..  ."  rethinking.  You're thinkow dare
he'I know what You" "that if Gran dies.  Miranda burst into tears.

Adam was astonished, partly because she had correctly guessed his
thoughts.  Also he had never before seen Miranda cry.  She rarely
showed her emotions.

He pulled a Paisley silk handkerchief from his navy blazer and silently
handed it to her.

"Damn, I've lost a contact lens," Miranda gulped.

"Can you see it on my skirt?  Or has it fallen to the fl oorT "Keep
still.  I can see it on your lap."

As Adam leaned over her, Miranda inhaled his faint musky scent.  Adam
moved in a miasma of sexuality, which he seemed not to notice although
it was as definite as warm breath.  She thought he smelled a bit like a
well groomed horse.  Close up, his odour reminded her of expensive
leather.  This subtle erotic scent contradicted Adam's careful lawyer's
demeanour, his understated Savile Row suits and shirts, his
horned-rimmed glasses.

Miranda knew that Adam had a devastating effect on women.  She had
first observed it on a shared family holiday in St-Tropez, twelve years
ago.  Miranda, only twelve at the time, had noticed that even the
grumpy old French housekeeper happily danced attendance on
twenty-three-year-old Miranda knew why Adam had never made a serious
pass her or her sisters.  To have done so would have been 11
Unprofessional and might have adversely affected his job.

"Additionally, all three sisters, while acknowledging his ctiveness,
had grown up thinking of Adam as a young -wWttra He in turn had always
regarded them as children, to their indignation at the time.

ta Now, as Adam carefully placed the con ct lens in the nrpahn of
Miranda's hand, she reminded herself that he was "',jrot her uncle.
Then she pushed this thought to the back of her head and told herself
jokin y to k her hands off the gI eep staff.  Turning away from Adam
to reinsert her lens, Miranda also reminded herself that at the moment
she hadn't time for a lover.  In this respect she was unusual; the Pill
was now readily available and every liberated girl was on it, whether
or not her mother knew.  Increasingly a woman was expected to jump into
bed after the first date something that didn't suit Miranda, who felt
only anxiety when in bed with a man whom she didn't know well and
therefore didn't trust.  At this point in her young life, there had
been only one man who made her feel secure.

Adam said, "Even if it distresses you, there's something I feel we
should discuss before reaching Saracen; it's your grandmother's will.
She hasn't yet made one, but we have discussed the matter."  Clearly
worried, Adam was silent for a moment, then continued in a low voice:
"For me, this is a difficult dilemma: do I stick to my standards of
professional discretion, or do I break my client's confidence in order
to do what's best for her and those she loves?  Does the end justify
the means?  Would Elinor my client, my friend and benefactor allow it?
That's what, I can't decide.  Because I know that Elinor would want
whatever is most advantageous to all her granddaughters."

"I'd advise you not to break your client's confidence," Miranda said,
"but be sensible and tell me what the hell this is about."

"Without breaking Elinor's confidence, I can tell you that although she
intends to leave the bulk of her fortune to you three sisters, various
methods of controlling the money have been considered."

"What do you mean, Adam, controlling the money?"  Whenever it came to
finances, Miranda was instinctively suspicious.

"She's anxious that the money not be ... frittered away.  There are
various possible ways of protecting it.  She doesn't the French legal
requirement to share the property equally among all descendants.  As
you know, Elinor lost touch with her family many years ago, and she
doesn't want her brother's children if he ever had any to suddenly
appear, claim money, make trouble.  But as Elinor is a resident of
France, this will happen unless she makes ... alternative
arrangements."

"What sort of arrangement sT Miranda demanded.

"She's had a few rather ... dramatic ideas, as you would expect.  She
doesh't like the British system, where the eldest inherits everything
on the understanding that the inheritor cares for the rest of the
family."

"I should think nod" Miranda was the youngest of the three sisters. For
her, primogeniture would be disastrous.

"Gran saw what happened to her own husband!"

Billy's grandmother, a considerable heiress, had left all her money to
her elder son, an impulsive weakling, who lost nearly all of it in an
Edwardian stock exchange swindle.  When he died, Billy's elder brother
inherited what was left of the family estate Billy inherited nothing.

"Elinor seems to think the Greek system is the most sensible," Adam
said.

"What's that "A wealthy Greek father often leaves all the family money
to the child most capable of looking after it, on the understanding
that the inheritor looks after the immediate family."

"The most financially capable sister is me," Miranda stated.

"In financial matters, certainly.  But Clare has always been very
conscientious and responsible; she was like a mother hen towards you
and Annabel when you were little girls."  Miranda sat up sharply.

"All my life I've had Clare shoved down my th road Clare was the
eldest, the responsible sister, whose duty it was to look after the
little ones.

'7 She could be relied upon because she was steady and practical.
Conscientious Clare would never tell a He not even a white one and
could be relied upon always to be fair, as Clare herself never stopped
reminding people.

It was Clare's much vaunted sense of justice that made her feel
responsible for the whole damn world, particularly every
underprivileged person in it, Miranda knew.  If Clare grabbed the purse
strings, then they would not be opened for Miranda, who was not Clare's
idea of a needy person.  Miranda would be pushed back to the position
of baby sister.

"Unfortunately, Elinor thinks you ... Would you say you were steadier
than Clare?"  Adam asked.

"You mean Gran thinks I'm too ... rash?"  J wouldn't say that,
exactly," Adam said reflectively, "although perhaps Elinor does think
you take too many risks.  She sees you as the daring young girl on the
flying trapeze of business.  But of course, Elinor doesn't understand
that in business, it's necessary to take risks.  I see your adventurous
streak as a business asset.", "It's not fair!"  Miranda retorted'
bitterly remembering how often she had said that as a child.

Eventually she asked, "What will happen if Gran dies without making a
will?"  "There may be a nasty legal mess that might take years to
disentangle," Adam said.

"And that's something I don't intend to allow.  As soon as Elinor is
well enough to do so, I will insist she make her decisions."  He
paused, then added: "There is an alternative to the Greek system that
would safeguard the money and yet be fair."

"What's that Miranda quickly looked at Adam.

"It would mean that you would be certain to get your fair share."

"What is it, Adam?"

"I wondered whether Elinor would respond favourably to the idea of
setting up a family trust," Adam mused.

"What do you think?  If you think not, then I don't want to distract
her by the idea."  Adam knew that, as the shrewdest and most forceful
of the sisters, Miranda would be a formidable.  opponent should she
object to his suggestion.

"What would be the point of setting up a trust?"  Miranda asked
cautiously.

"Making a trust is a bit like making a will, except that you put it
into practice before you die," Adam explained.

"If Elinor were to set up a trust, naming her granddaughters and their
descendants as beneficiaries, then the money would be protected as
Elinor wishes, because there's no risk that one heir can squander it
all.  The trustees wouldn't allow it: their job is to guard the trust,
not slavishly obey the whims of the beneficiaries."  Miranda ran her
hand through wild red hair.

"You mean Clare couldn't sit on the money and refuse to share it, and
she couldn't give it away to charity?  And Annabel couldn't buy a
couple of yacht sT "Exactly.  The advantage of a trust is that there
would be a permanent cautionary control over the capital," Adam said.

"I suspect that you would have nothing to lose, Miranda, were a trust
to be established and you might possibly have a great deal to gain.
Trustees do not like frivolous expenditure; they might, shall we say,
guard your sisters from themselves."  Miranda said firmly, "Then I vote
for a trust."

"And what do you think Annabel will want?"

Adam asked.

"Perhaps it would be best if you discussed this with her, rather than
me."  Such a matter was always difficult to bring up with a close
relative at such a time: that was why he had discussed it with Miranda
before their arrival at Saracen.  Adam added apologetically, "You know
better than I do how to handle Annabel so that such a discussion won't
upset her.  I'm afraid she'd turn on me, perhaps think I'm being
cold-blooded."  11 don't see why she should," Miranda said.

"But I think you should talk to her because you can answer her
questions, if she has any; I know nothing about the legal
ramifications.  Don't worry, Adam.  Of course, Annabel is ridiculously
sentimental, but after all, you have nothing to gain you're only trying
to prevent trouble for us.  Basically, I'm confident that Annabel won't
want Clare holding the purse strings, back in a position to boss us
around.  Stress that to Annabel and she won't be sentimental."

The apricot flush of the evening sky paled beyond the balustrade of the
terrace, and the quivering reflections of the sea faded on Elinor's
bedroom ceiling.  She had been drifting in and out of sleep; the
churning noise of the helicopter rotors finally awakened her.  After
the noise ceased, Elinor heard shrieked greetings and laughter from the
far terrace.  Only a few moments later, her bedroom door burst open.

"Darling Gran, this is wonderful!"  Miranda ran to the bedside and
kissed her grandmother.

"Welcome back!"

Outside on the terrace, while Clare put two-year-old Josh to bed, Adam
sipped champagne and chatted with Annabel.  As he had done to Miranda,
he mentioned the possibility of a trust as an alternative to Clare's
being left in charge of the family fortune.

Annabel reacted with surprise, followed by irritation.

"I had quite enough of being pushed about by Clare when we were
children.  Tell me more about this trust idea."

After dinner, Adam suggested to Clare that they take a walk.  He wanted
to be sure there would be no time-wasting opposition or bickering among
the sisters when Elinor had so little strength left.

"Do we really have to talk about this now, Ada mT Clare in no mood for
financial discussion as they sauntered downhill, through winding narrow
streets lined by bougainvillea and dimly lit by old-fashioned
lampposts.

"I hoped that I could rely on you to be sensible, not sentimental,"
Adam said firmly.  He added, "I'm only trying to arrange what Elinor
would want and what is best for all of you.  That's my duty as Elinor's
adviser."  " Clare thought how pompous Adam sounded.  Why did Gran
always have to have some man around to tell her what to do?  When Daddy
Billy was alive, his word had always been final.  Then Gran's lawyer
Joe Grant had become the great male authority figure in their lives,
and now his son, Adam, had inherited the mantle of wisdom.

"I don't see what's wrong with just sharing it out," Clarree said.

"In case you haven't noticed, old friend, we aren't babies any longer.
I'm a grown-up married woman."  Hesitantly Adam said, "Miranda and
Annabel like the concept of a trust."  .  Clare spoke tartly.

"Of course Annabel will agree without thinking to whatever Miranda
suggests, because -that's what she's always done.  But I don't see why
a trust is necessary.  In fact, it seems an -inecessarily complicated
idea., IShe was as stubborn as her grandmother, Adam thought
regretfully as he tried a new tack.

-Clare listened, then shook her head lightly and said, "It won't work
any more with me, Adam.  I've heard it too often."

"Heard what?"  "The adult equivalent of "Daddy knows best.""

CHAPTER 2

TUESDAY, 6 JULY 1965 Dr.  Montand stepped from the glare of the morning
sun into the chfiteauls shaded interior.  The entrance hall was scented
by roses in a blue jug on a dark antique chest.  He was greeted in
atrocious French by an angular woman with carelessly dyed jet-black
hair; as they walked to the elevator, the doctor spoke in fluent
English; so many Riviera residents spoke only English that an ambitious
practitioner needed to be bilingual.

The woman was Buzz, Elinor's oldest friend.  In 1947, after Billy's
death, Buzz had travelled to Elinor's house in the Wiltshire
countryside and had simply never left it; she saw that the house ran
smoothly, supervised the three little girls and their nanny, paid the
bills, did the bookkeeping, and relieved Elinor of all small
distracting tasks, so that she could concentrate on writing novels.

Buzz came from a working-class background and had a harsh south London
accent; her frequent cockney modification of the Queen's English made
it easier for the Riviera natives to understand her French than her
English.  Because her manner was blunt and matter-of-fact, outsiders
tended to underestimate Buzz, even to ignore her.  She simply ignored
them in return.  She watched and listened and made up her own mind
about everything.  But no matter what, Buzz always protected her friend
Elinor sometimes from herself.

The elevator jerked to a halt at the bedroom floor, where a maid folded
sheets into a cherrywood armoire: each pile of antique, lace-trimmed
linen was tied with butter coloured silk ribbon.

T1w family bedrooms led off this hall.  On the floor above were six
suites for guests, each with its own bedroom, bathroom, and small
kitchen.  The entire chdteau had been planned so that, should Elinor
ever again find herself short of cash an unlikely event but her
constant back-of-the mind anxiety she could easily turn the Chiteau de
Saracen into a luxury hotel.  The owners of the two hotels in the
village, uneasily aware of this, were almost as delighted as Elinor
when each of her romantic novels leapt straight on to the world's
best-seller lists.

Before opening Elinor's door, Buzz turned abruptly to the doctor and
said, "You'll tell me the truth, won't you?  I can take it, but them
girls can't."

"I have told you all I know," said Dr.  Montand.

"Madame O'Dare has had a partial stroke a cerebral vascular accident,
as we call it."  The doctor patiently repeated what he had said the
previous evening.

"Her left arm and leg are paralysed and so is the left side of her
face.  Later, she will need further investigation: an arterial brain
scan, X-rays, and electroencephalography.  At the moment, there's no
point in taking her to a hospital in Nice: anything that can be done
there can be done with nursing help here, in her hoi ne Buzz nodded.

"A better idea.  No risk of cross-infection.  Hits one in four patients
in Western hospitals!  "I see that you keep up to date," the doctor
said, assuming that this tall, graceless woman in the unfashionable
navy dress had once been a nurse.  He sensed that unspoken complicity
between nurses and doctors, an absence of the frightened trust that
most relatives exhibited.

Buzz's shrewd eyes had asked the question before her mouth: "Will she
make a complete recovery?"

Dr.  Montand shrugged.

"She's not overweight.  You say she doesn't smoke or drink heavily. She
isn't diabetic, and her blood pressure is almost normal for her age." 
The patient was sixty-five years old, and no civilized doctor would
suggest that she go on a dict, cut out drink entirely, or take up
exercise.  He would counsel them to let her enjoy her remaining life
should she recover.

Buzz pushed an unnaturally black wisp of hair behind her ear.

"You ain't answered my question."

"It's too early to tell," the doctor said.

"It takes time ta, recover.  A patient often has impaired mentality but
not always.  I really cannot say.  Now you should get some rest,
madame, after sitting up with her all night."  She hadn't said so, but
this woman was the sort that didn't trust a night nurse.

After the doctor had finished his daily poking and probing of Elinor,
Buzz returned to the bedside.  Elinor lay in a cream lace nightdress
against silk pillows.

"He says you'll soon be as fit as a fiddle," Buzz said.

"I'm getting a physiotherapist so you'll get proper exercise."

"But I'm too weak.  And I can't move or talk properly," Elinor
protested, her voice still slurred.

"A phys io will soon get you on your feet, Nell..

"But will I ever talk properly again'?  My left cheek feels frozen, as
if I've had a dentist's injection."

"You'll talk properly soon enough then the Lord help us."  Elinor's
anxiety dissolved, and she relaxed.  Buzz was so reassuring, so
comforting.  The two women had shared some tough times when they were
young.  Buzz knew Elinor's faults and didn't care; Buzz would never
reveal her secrets.

"What exactly does Buzz doT people sometimes asked.  Supposedly a
secretary, Buzz never typed if she could avoid it, and whatever
shorthand she may have known was long forgotten.

"She protects me,"

"Elinor would say with a little laugh.

"But why do you let a secretary speak to you in that Offband way7 Why
do You let her criticize You?  Why do you put up with her?"  Elinor
would firmly close the subject by answering, "We've been together a
long time.  You wouldn't understand."

Although outsiders never understood their relationship, it was clear
enough to the two women: Elinor was Buzz's friend and her boss; Buzz
was Elinor's secretary but not her slave.  Elinor was glad to have
forgotten what life was like without Buzz, this odd woman who had
become a vital part of her existence.

They had met long ago, during the First World War, on a drizzling
autumn day in 1918.  That day was to have terrible consequences for
Buzz, although to eighteen-year old Elinor it had been just another of
those endless, stinking, exhausting everyday scenes in a casualty
clearing station near the front line.

On that November evening, an ambulance convoy had just arrived at
casualty reception.  Grey-blanketed stretchers were everywhere, many on
the floor.  The filthy, exhausted men on the stretchers wore muddy,
torn khaki; their bandages were dirty and bloodstained.

"Hey, Nurse!"  Hearing the high-pitched nasal voice, Elinor turned. She
realized, to her surprise, that the lanky ambulance driver with dark
cropped hair was a woman.

"I've just driven in a diphtheria case," the driver said.

"He's in a bad way.  Should be seen immediately.  He's also got a
smashed left patella and a fracture of the left tibia.  Get a surgeon,
will you?"

A tired young surgeon took one look at the ginger-haired soldier
struggling to breathe and said, "Tracheotomy.  Get him on the table
fast, Nurse.  No time to scrub up."  He gestured to the small side
room, which contained an emergency operating table.

Lying on the table, the young patient gasped for breath as the membrane
in his throat started to strangle him.

I The surgeon nodded at Elinor.

"You take his head!"  Then he turned to the ambulance driver.

"Do you think you can hold him down?"  She nodded.  As Elinor held the
injured man's head firmly to the sandbag pillow, the weary surgeon
lifted a sharp scalpel from the tray on the trolley.  Elinor saw his
hand shake.

The surgeon glanced at Elinor and hesitated.  If he accidentally slit
the jugular vein, the patient would die.

Elinor prayed silently.

"Please God, let him get it right.", The doctor still hesitated, his
shaking right hand revealing his exhaustion.

The patient's gasps changed to a gurgle.  Elinor thought, If he doesn't
cut now, this lad is going to die anyway.

The surgeon leaned over the ginger head and with the scalpel made a
swift incision.

Immediately a crimson stream flowed from the patient's neck.

Elinor kept her eyes on the dying man because she did not want to look
at the surgeon.  Wearily he said, "Clean up, Nurse, and move him out of
here.  I'd better get back."

After the surgeon had left, Elinor looked at the lanky girl; her face
was white as her dark eyes stared down at the young man who had just
died.

"Did you know him?"  Elinor asked gently.

Slowly, with chattering teeth, the girl said, "We was going to be
married, Ginger and me."  Later, in Elinor's Nissen hut, the women
shared a tin mug of milk less cocoa.  Elinor knew that the white-faced
girl, who had not yet shed a tear, must be suffering from shock: she
was moving in a daze but chattering as though nothing out of the
ordinary had happened.

"Poor Ginger was one of my stretcher-bearers.  They'll let his mother
think he died a hero's death for King and country, not that he tripped
over someone's boot in a pench, fell off the duckboard, was
Accidentally shot in the k by some trigger-happy idiot, then left out
in the open too long, and afterwards killed by a mistake."

"The surgeon's only human.  We all make mistakes," Elinor said
wearily.

"I know I do."

The girl sighed.

"This whole ruddy war's a mistake."

"What's your nam eT Elinor asked.

"Buzz Mam."

"That sounds more American than English."

"You're right.  I was christened Doris.  Some doughboys gave me the
nickname 'cause I always seem to be the first one in the know.  Simply
a matter of keeping your ears open and talking to the walking wounded
before they're handed over to you nurses to sort out the mess.  Cor,
what a rotten job you nurses have!"

"Your job doesn't look so hot to me."

"I was ruddy lucky to get accepted as an ambulance driver," Buzz
said.

"Generally, the War Office don't take working-class girls from Tooting;
they take nice gels with private means, because we're all volunteers
and practically unpaid."

"Then how did you wangle it?  Elinor asked.

"I was working as a housemaid in Wimbledon nice family, indoor staff of
nine and our Miss Ruth was determined to volunteer.  So the mistress
made me go along as well.  I was supposed to look after Miss Ruth.
There wasn't half a bit of string-pulling, I can tell you!  Of course,
I had to say I was twenty-three, not eighteen.  Miss Ruth wasn't a bad
sort but she wasn't used to this sort of life.  Before we'd been here
three weeks, she got pneumonia with complications, nearly died, and had
to be sent back to Blighty.  The commandant puts up with my lack of
breeding as I heard her call it because I understand how an engine
works, and there ain't many ladies as does."

After that, the two young women met often in Elinoes hut.,-
Efiaorw.wintrigued" by Buzz's brusque attitude, her lai of concern over
what other people thought of her, her contempt for anyone in command
and her carefully hidden warmth and kindness.

just as she had comforted Buzz when Ginger died, Elinor was comforted,
two months later, by Buzz, who found.  her crying quietly on her
narrow, hard bed in the Nissen hut.

What' supT Buzz asked.

Without a word, Elinor handed her the letter.

"Dear Nell," Buzz read.

"This is a hard thing to tell you but your dear mother passed away. She
been ill six month with tubercerloosis but would not let me write you. 
Last Sunday about five she quietly slipped away and we buried
herWensday.  I nursed her well as I could.  She had Doc Mackenzie and
drugs but it was too late.  On Saturday she says to me, Listen Marius,
I feel better.  It does not matter I am thin.  You can fatten me like a
Christmas goose now I am healthy again.  She had a decent buriel, with
Casket, Hurse and Grave at St.  Mary to the far left of the porch.  My
poor girl was in her wedding dress she was all skin and bone.  She was
very dear to me although I'did not tell her often.  Your grieving
father Marius F Dove."  Eventually Elinor gulped, "At least this means
I'll never have to see him again."  Buzz and Elinor had now been close
friends for forty-seven years, and so far as Elinor was concerned, Buzz
had only one failing: she had never liked Billy.

Once again Elinor turned her head to look at the photograph of Billy
beside her bed.  She thought back to the humiliation she had suffered
from his relatives" disdain, though in the end it had been she who
restored the fortune of Billy's family.  Elinor was now the star more
socially acceptable than they had ever been.  And she certainly
wouldn't make the same financial mistake that they had.

I Now, in the warmth of the Riviera, within the splendour of her
castle, Elinor looked up at Buzz and said in a faint but determined
voice, "I must be sure that those girls are safe for life ... I want
them to have a happy life, with no burdens ... I want them to have what
you and I missed: more time time to enjoy life, time to think.  More
time for their children than I had for Edward."  Buzz said soothingly,
"You did the best you could at the time, Nell, and that's as much as
any person can be expected to do.  Maybe it was lucky you only had one
kid."  Buzz knew better than to express her opinion on why this was
so.

Elinor whispered, "I want to see Adam now."

"I'll not have you talk business when you're barely able to talk at
all," Buzz said.

"We'll wait till you beat me at Scrabble."  Before Elinor's stroke,
they had played one game a day, always at five o'clock.  At the end of
the previous year, the score had been Elinor 36 games, Buzz 329.

"Buzz, this is urgent.  I haven't made a will."  Buzz turned to the
bed.

"That's not urgent, you old fool.  Important, but not urgent.  You'll
just have to wait!  I'm not letting that Adam in before the doctor
okays it, and that's flat!  I'm off to make you a dish of mashed
bananas and cream.  You can eat it with a teaspoon.  I know what you
like, Nell."  Elinor smiled.  She had spent her LIFE looking after
other people and now it felt strange, but pleasant, to lie with her
eyes closed while other people glided around her, murmuring and making
the decisions for her.

MONDAY, 19 JULY 1965

Two weeks later, seated on one of the silver-grey sofas in front of
Elinor's bedroom fireplace, Adam quickly sorted out his papers, then
placed them on the low table before him.  Buzz had warned him that he
had only a few minutes.

Elinor's voice was still weak and she remained able to talk only out
of the right side of her mouth.

"I'm sorry I didn't do this earlier, Adam," she said.

"There's no hurry."  The lawyer had been well briefed by Buzz.

"We might as well settle it now, though, if you feel up to it."  With
difficulty, Elinor lifted her head.

"Put those papers down, Adam.  Come and sit by me."

As Adam moved to the bedside, he glanced towards the photographs
clustered on Elinor's table.  One was a group photo of First World War
pilots, their faces flushed with victory.  He found it sad that one of
those jaunty, carefree young men had turned into his careful, punctual
father a pillar of the local community, respected in the legal world; a
man who had never been allowed by his wife to forget that he had
married the boss's daughter and had better live up to it.  He had done
so, concealing his feelings, hiding them behind a carefully organized
life in a comfortable country mansion not far from London.

The sight of frail Elinor, so recently close to death, nearly caused
Adam to momentarily" lose his composure.  Her fragility, her pale face,
the smell of the sick room, stirred his sense of loss.  His father had
died, very slowly, from lung cancer.  What Adam most regretted losing
was what he had never had: the father-and-son companionship that other
chaps casually enjoyed.  Of course, there had been little chance of
spending time with his old man when Adam was a child and confined to
the nursery by a mother who had preferred bridge to motherhood.  Adam
also wished that when he was growing up he'd been more understanding of
his father's behaviour.  The old man hadn't really been as harsh and
demanding as he seemed.  Adam grew to understand that he'd only wanted
his elder son to get the best out of life.  And when Adam was articled
to the family law firm, he knew, Dad had been careful to have ng to do
with him in the office because he hadn't k a, to appear to favour him
over the other clerks.

had always known that was the reason, but it had hurt at the time.

Elinor noticed Adam's glance at the photograph and whispered, "I still
miss your dear father.  Joe looked after my affairs so well, especially
after Billy died."

Adam smiled reassuringly.

"I'm here to help you, just as Father would have done.  Simply tell me
what you want and I'll arrange it.  I have a list of your assets here.
Perhaps you would like to tell me which people you might ... want to
have something ... at some time in the future, and then I'll draw up a
... document for you to consider."  Noting Elinor's silence, Adam
wondered if her mind worked more slowly now.  He said, "Do you want to
leave any money to your family in America?"  She reflected briefly on
her brother, and again considered whether he might still be alive, with
children of his own.  She remembered the jealousy she had felt at her
father's obvious love for Paul, "and her pain because of his lack of
interest in 'her.  She had always felt guilty for being a girl and
therefore not strong enough to carry out the perennial chores on the
farm in Minnesota.  Her childhood had been spent in terror of her
father's rages and his ability to reduce her to a cowering, bewildered
creature.  How she had dreaded his anger, which always seemed to be
directed at her.  How she had hoped for just once some sign that he
loved her; instead, the only love she ever felt came from her mother, a
sad, broken creature.  Elinor remembered her relief at finally breaking
away from her family and their hold on her.

She shook her head slowly.

"No.  They never did anything for me.  And I haven't heard from them
since 1932, when my brother had to sell the farm.  I inherited nothing
and I owe him nothing.  So I think the simplest thing would be to
divide everything between the three girls and Buzz..

Adam looked worried.

"The simplest thing is not always the wisest," he said gently.

"The girls must be protected from possible exploitation, embezzlement,
and theft.  You've always protected those three lucky sisters from
harsh reality, from the jungle of life."  He hesitated.

"Perhaps they should now also be protected from ... themselves ...
unless you truly believe that they will always look after the money
carefully and prudently, taking no risks and resisting the temptation
of extravagance."  Elinor considered Adam's words of caution.  She
didn't care to think of her girls as wasteful, but there were warning
signs.  Fleetingly she thought back to Annabel's eighteenth birthday,
when, exuberantly, the girl had jumped into the terrace fountain and
ruined her pink Hartnell ball gown  Miranda clearly took dangerous
risks in an already highrisk business, and she seemed to think nothing
of hiring a helicopter, at heaven knows what cost, simply to travel to
London for a few hours.  Why did Miranda waste money in this way?

Adam said, "Of course I know that Clare, as the eldest, has always been
very responsible, but I am concerned lest she be persuaded to be, shall
we say, over charitable  Clare seems to think that it's her
responsibility to look after the entire world."  Elinor understood that
Adam was warning her that her hard-earned fortune might well go down
the drain with amazing speed.

"The girls must be prepared," Adam went on, "to spend considerable
amount of time doing their financial homework and discussing their
business affairs with stockbrokers, accountants, lawyers, and other
professional advisers."  Elinor considered what he had said.

"Well, you already look after Miranda's affairs, don't you, Adam?  And
the other two have husbands to handle that sort of thing."

Adam looked slightly embarrassed.

"I feel I should perps play devil's advocate and point out do forgive
me that Clare's husband is a film producer: some of his films have been
successful but not all of them.  I'm sure that, should he persuade
Clare to invest your money in his movies, e would expect them to be
successful ... but such risky investment can be hugely expensive, as
well as dangerous., Inwardly Elinor shuddered though her rigid body
stayed still.

Adam continued, "And there is one other thing: the vorce rate is
rapidly increasing.  There is now one divorce to every three marriages
in Britain, and I believe the rate is even higher in America.  Of
course, we all hope that they will both stay happily married, but
Clare's husband has been married twice before, and as a lawyer, I can
tell you that it is a rare husband who will put his wife's financial
interests before his own in the event of ... such a sad event."  He
paused briefly to let Elinor consider.

"Clare and Annabel are both charming and delightful young women, but
are you completely confident that they have the financial acumen to
handle a fortune especially as they have no training or experience in
such matters?-In particular, do you think that Annabel would be willing
... or capable?"  Annabel was everybody's favourite sister, but she was
also known as the family scatterbrain a not-too bright beauty with a
sunny temperament.

After a few moments of silence, Adam added, "And I can't help
wondering, should Annabel ever be on her own, whether she would not be
easy prey for fraudsters or ... the sort of men who, frankly, stalk
women with money."  Elinor spoke in a whisper.

"Please tell me what to do, Adam.  You always know best."  So Adam
explained the advantages of setting up a family trust, concluding, "Of
course, a main advantage would be that the trustees men of impeccable
reputation would relieve the girls of all responsibility, make all
business decisions, and operate the trust smoothly, to your
satisfaction, before ... during your lifetime."

After a thoughtful silence, Elinor whispered, "A very sensible idea.
The Dove Trust.  Why didn't you suggest it before now, Ada niT "You
preferred me not to discuss your ... these matters," Adam reminded
her.

"Whom would you appoint as trustee sT Elinor asked.

Briskly Adam replied, "I do not advise a bank, no matter how
respectable.  They are in business to make money for themselves."  He
knew that the aim of a bank would be to get as much money as was
possible and legal out of the trust account.  This might well erode the
money a small percentage here, another there by as much as five per
cent a year; if so, within twenty years, Elinor's fortune would belong
to the bank.  Adam cautioned especially against Swiss banks.

"They are the best publicists and the worst extortionists.  That's why
they put up such an impressive facade of you-can-trust-us reassurance,
with expensive writing paper and old-fashioned business offices meant
to look as if they have been doing respectable and reliable business
for hundreds of years."

"Then whom do you advise?"  "You need reliable, responsible
professionals whom you can confidently expect to keep a careful eye on
all the affairs of the Dove Trust.  The trust will hold all your major
assets, although, of course, you will also need to make a will for
minor things, such as the disposal of personal effects.

"The trust will then administer the estate," Adam went on, "and
annually consider whether to apportion any of the trust income to the
beneficiaries named by you, and if so, how much."  4"H40W much does a
trust cost to runT Elinor whispered.

in's well-intentioned warnings had enervated her.  r "The cost of
setting it up would be about a thousand pounds, perhaps a little more,
if property, such as the chaRteau, is involved.  The yearly charge
might be half a per cent of the trust value.  The trustees could
continue to work with your present bank, stockbroker, and other
advisers."

"Would STG'continue to be my lawyer sT "Of course.  In fact, should you
wish, our firm could act as trustees."  Buzz's head appeared around the
door.

"Two minutes more, Adam."  Then she saw Elinor's pale face and said,
"No, you'd better leave now."

"Two more minutes."  Adam smiled gravely at.  Buzz, who hesitated,
nodded, then shut the door.

Adam looked at Elinor thoughtfully over the top of his horn-rimmed
spectacles.

"That reminds me.  In my judgement, it would be best not to include
Buzz in the trust.  She pan be looked after by them exactly as you
wish, in the same way as the girls but for many reasons, in our
experience the experience of Swithin, Timmins and Grant, it is simplest
to confine a family trust to family members only.  And there are other
legal reasons that I won't bother you with."

"Are you sure Buzz will be properly looked after?"  Elinor inquired
anxiously.

"I'm absolutely certain of that."  Adam shuffled his papers into order
and stood up.

"How long does it take to set up?"  Immediately Adam understood the
implications of "Elinor's question.  He said reassuringly, "It could be
done in two weeks, but in an emergency overnight."

"Better do it as fast as possible," Elinor murmured, ding, "I'd like
you to explain everything to Buzz and the as soon as possible."

"I'm here to do whatever you wish," Adam reassured her.

"I'm happy to explain your wishes to Buzz and the girls ... but only
when your doctor allows such a meeting.  We mustn't tire you, Elinor."
That afternoon, all of them sitting on prim Directoire chairs arranged
around Elinor's sumptuous bed, Adam could see that the girls felt
uneasy, as if they had suddenly realized that this was a formal
occasion; something important was about to happen.

Buzz clucked a bit to ease the atmosphere.

"Them shorts you're wearing don't leave much to the imagination," she
said to Clare, who wore white tennis clothes.

"Why didn't you put on something pretty for your gran, like Anna belT
Annabel had changed from her swimsuit into a bluebell silk dress.

"Don't nag, Buzz."  Miranda, in pink slacks and matching blouse, knew
that she had passed the decency test.

"Let's start this meeting, Adam."  Gravely Adam said, "Your grandmother
has decided to establish a family trust, for the benefit of you, her
granddaughters."  In a carefully neutral voice, he then explained
Elinor's plan and stated the amount of money involved.

"Just under nine million pounds!"  Miranda gasped.

Annabel's mouth stayed half open.

"Heavens, that's ... that's about twenty-seven million dollarsP Clare
spoke hesitantly.

"That's much too much money for just one person ... or one family."
Detecting a certain frostiness from her grandmother's direction, she
added, "I mean nobody should have such a huge sum when half the world
is starving."

Adam saw that Clare was behaving exactly as he had expected: ever the
romantic idealist and liberal.  Priding herself on her honesty, she
would end up a loser.  Starting now.

"S How does a trust work?"  Buzz asked warily.  It a bit like setting
up a company, but one run by instead of directors," Adam explained.

"To check that the trustees do their job properly, a trust protector is
appointed, to act as a sort of policeman.  The trust is funded by the
person who sets it up in this case, Elinor and will be run for the
benefit of the beneficiaries named by Elinor in this case, her
descendants.  In case," Adam added, "at some future point, there should
be no descendants, a final beneficiary should be named, although that
might not be relevant for a couple of hundred years."  Elinor liked the
idea of her trust continuing for hundreds of years, producing yearly
dividends.

"But if Elinor isn't a beneficiary, will she have any future control
over the trust possession sT Clare asked.

"What about Buzz?  She isn't a descendant of Elinor O'Dare," Annabel
said.

Adam ignored that for the moment and said, "The trust will always
consider Elinor's wishes in every respect.  She can put all her
requests in writing to the trust."

"And must the trustees obey her?"  Miranda asked.

"The trustees use their own judgement, as do a board of directors, and
should always act in the best interest of the beneficiaries."

"Sounds a bit complicated a bit unusual ain' tiff Buzz said
suspiciously.

"A trust situation is not unusual among the wealthy," Adam explained.

"To avoid death duties and bad money management, Lord X makes over his
fortune to his children, on the understanding that they will provide
for him until he dies."

"What if the kids don't see it that way?"  Buzz asked.

"What if the kids change their minds, after Lord X has signed over all
his worldly wealth?"  "If the children aren't trustworthy, then of
course you wouldn't consider such a trust."  Adam's voice was
carefully civil.

Buzz said, "If Elinor gives everything she owns to this here trust,
then what does she live on?"  "The trust can provide Elinor with a
salary for the work she does, which will provide ample money, after
tax, for her to live on."  Miranda concealed her exasperation. 
Couldn't Buzz see that the reason for a trust was that Elinor was
almost certainly dying? "And who will these all-powerful trustees beT
Clare asked.

"Elinor's lawyers have been asked to provide trustees," Adam said.

"Elinor knows that STG are capable and reliable, and she doesn't want
to deal with people she doesn't know.  So I propose to ask our Bermuda
office to set it up.  Offshore trusts are not liable to alteration by
changing laws."

"You mentioned a protector.  Who will that beT Miranda inquired.

"Probably Paul Littlejohn, who now works in our Bermuda office" He is
familiar with Elinor's affairs."  Buzz frowned, looked at Elinor's
white face, bit her lip, started to speak, then clearly thought better
of it and stayed silent.

Relieved that the meeting seemed to be finished, Elinor asked in a
shaky voice, "So it's settled then?"  Clare said uncertainly, "Can we
talk a little more?  Because I don't like this idea.  If Gran wants to
leave us some money, why can't she just do that?  Why complicate the
situation?"  "Adam knows best," Elinor told her firmly..

"Don't be difficult, Clare."

"I think I'm old enough to be in charge of my own financial affairs,"
Clare protested.

OWL, "there's no proof of that," Miranda said sharply.

"You'veer had any business experience."

"I'm confident that I can manage my own."  Clare was indignant now.

"I'm a married woman with a child.  Surely that's proof of my
responsibility.  Why do I need to be nannied by lawyer sT Elinor said
faintly, "Adam has gone to a great deal of trouble to organize this,
and Adam knows what's best for us, darling."

"Why does Adam know what's best for me?"  Clare asked in an exasperated
tone.

"Because Adam's a professional man," Elinor whispered.

"He's a qualified lawyer with years of legal experience.  That's why.;
"Gran, all my life you've told me that some man in a ar suit knows
best," Clare said.

"It started when we were little girls, with Daddy Billy.  "Daddy knows
best" was what you always said.  But we all knew even then that he
didn't.  I don't want to find myself in another nursery situation,
being told that Daddy knows best only this time Daddy is some lawyer
that I've never met, some faceless man who's sitting in the middle of
the Atlantic."

"Now, Clare, no criticism of Daddy Billy," Buzz warned.  She hated this
name Billy O'Dare had given himself, she suspected because he couldn't
bear to think of himself as old enough to be a grandfather.

"Sorry.  I didn't mean to criticize Daddy Billy," Clare said quickly,
but she knew that this was an important conversation with her
grandmother, so she leaned towards Elinor and said, "I'm only trying to
be truthful, Gran.  I don't like 'this ideaf "Adam's gone to all this
trouble Elinor repeated faintly.

"But why didn't you discuss the idea with us beforehand, if w6're to be
the beneficiaries?"  Clare protested.

"I told you.  Because Adam knows best, dear.  He's an expert.  I pay
him to think about these things carefully and decide, and it would be
foolish not to take his advice."

"Miranda doesn't treat Adam with such deference," Clare pointed out.
She couldn't understand why her grandmother had never had confidence in
her own decision-making, had never trusted her own instincts and
judgement.

"Clare," Elinor said, "please show a little more respect for Adam!  I
am so sorry, Adam"

"I wish you'd stop treating us like children," Clare cried.

"You sound just like you did when we were little.  Whenever we
questioned some decision, you always said, "Because Daddy knows best"I
It wasn't a logical answer then, and it still isn't.  Can't you see
that, Gran?  Why do you always say, "Because Adam knows best'T "Because
he does," Elinor said firmly.

"You've always taken some man's advice, and you've always managed to
produce some good reason for doing so."  Clare wondered whether this
was her grandmother's way of trying to avoid final responsibility for
her actions.

"Now, now, Clare," Buzz said reprovingly.

"You ain't writing Wuthering Heights."  This was a gentle family joke,
used when Elinor became over dramatic

Equally anxious to defuse the situation, Annabel the family peacemaker-
spoke up.  "I'd also like to ask a question.  Could this trust set up
awards, burs aries things like that Annabel, who remembered Elinor's
beaming pride when the University of Minneapolis asked her to donate
her manuscripts to their library, continued.

"For instance, could the trust use some of this money to set up an
annual Elinor Dove prize a literary award on a popular level a really
big award that couldn't be ignored by reviewers who sneer at popular
fiction?  And how about an Elinor Dove travelling scholarship for the
most promising first novel of the year, and a few more similar things
that would impress the literary world?"  Clare burst out, "You can't be
serious, Annabel!  Anything like that would make the literary world see
Gran as an even bigger" Buzz stood up.

"That's enough, Clare!  If you can't behave, you'd better leave."

"Am I being told to leave the room like a disobedient child?"  Clare
retorted.

"That's about it," Buzz said levelly.  Clare's the one that's most like
Elinor, she thought to herself.  Got that same" passionate, extra
stubborn, extra strong, and wilful nature.

Nobody spoke.  Everyone watched Elinor.  In the stormy silence, Elinor
croaked, "If you are so dismissive of my work, my money, my advisers,
and their plan for the future, then perhaps you would prefer not to
participate in it, Clare.  You need not be named as a trust
beneficiary."

"That's okay by ineP Clare's lips trembled.  She was damned if she was
going to be manipulated like this.  And she certainly wasn't going to
cry in front of Adam.

Adam said reprovingly, "I think you had better apologize to your
grandmother, Clare."  Clare stood up and silently left the room.  Adam
coughed.

"Elinor, do you wish Clare included in the trust?"  "Of course," both
sisters said in unison.

Elinor said crossly, "I don't want Clare put in the trust as a
beneficiary until she has apologized to me."  Her voice was clear and
firm.

"You can't leave Clare outP Annabel protested.

"You must put her in!"  insisted Miranda.

Adam looked embarrassed.

"I suppose, formally, I ... er ... ought to protest on my client's
behalf at this attempt at coercion," he said lamely.

"Oh, shut up, Adam," Buzz said.

very one present knew that Elinor was generous and indulgent, except
when she thought she was being taken for granted or taken for a ride.
Then she could be as tough as nails.  At that point, if criticized or
made in any way to feel guilty or vulnerable, Elinor became incredibly
stubborn.

Buzz said, "Elinor, I'm sure it bothers you that Clare would prefer you
wrote that kitchen sink stuff about poor people with miserable lives. I
know she criticized your books.  But you don't want to hurt Clare in
this way."  Buzz's last sentence was almost an order.

"Clare hurt me," Elinor responded stubbornly, a theatrical note in her
shaky voice.  Another page from Wuthering Heights'they all noticed.

Sourly Buzz said, "I suppose you'd like the butler to hand Clare a
tourist-class ticket back to Los Angeles."

"That's enough, Buzz."  Elinor leaned back limply against the pile of
pillows.

"Elinor, you're just being stubborn."  Buzz spoke crossly now.

"What you don't like in Clare is what she's inherited from you!"  The
kitchen timer in Buzz's pocket blared, and she stood up.

"Time's up," she said.- "Outside, the lot of you!  In double-quick
time!"

"I have just one further thing to say, to Adam alone."  Elinor's voice
was faint.

After the door closed and Adam and Elinor were alone, she said slowly,
"You'd better get this trust set up as fast as possible, dear boy.  A
little later, we can add Clare's name to the beneficiaries."

"No," Adam said, "the trust would be irrevocable in that respect."

"Well, go down to the pool and ask Clare to apologize.  Elinor's voice
trembled with exhaustion now.

"Ask her nicely.  Come straight back and tell me what she says.  I hope
I've already made it clear that I won't be intimidated and I won't be
bullied.  I'm sure she'll be a sensible girl.

-A

nd then everything will be neatly settled."  She gave a "deep sigh of
relief.

"Hurry," she whispered.

Adam sauntered to the swimming pool and squatted on his haunches by the
side.

"Your grandmother wants an unconditional apology from you for what you
said about her books, her money, and her advisers.  She wants it
immediately, and I think you should know that she intends to pumsh you
severely should you not do this."  Clare looked up, astonished.  She
stood in the water and smoothed back her wet hair.

"I'm a married woman, Adam, not a child who can be stood in the corner
until it gives in.  I won't respond to threats.  I believe that what I
said was true and I see no reason to retract any of it."

"So you won't apologize?"  "Certainly not."  Elinor looked up,
cheerfully expectant, as Adam entered her bedroom.  Her expression
changed when she saw his perplexed face.

"I'm sorry, "Adam said, "but Clare refuses to a ologize.  I p put the
matter to her fairly forcibly, knowing ... the possible consequences."
Elinor sighed.

"What exactly did Clare say?"  "She said, "Certainly not."" A-dam broke
the silence that had fallen between them.

"Do you wish Clare toer ... be included in the trust?"  Elinor's voice
sounded very weary.

"Of course I want Clare included in the trust.  But please don't tell
her not until she has come around.  You would think she could put aside
her stubbornness at a time like this."

Adam glanced warily at Elinor and said nothing.

Through the window of her ground-floor office, Buzz could

X4

clearly hear angry voices at the swimming pool, where Miranda and
Annabel had joined their sister.

Sadly Buzz thought, hardly a cross word among them since they were
children and now listen!  And when their grandmother is on her
deathbed!  She knew that because the sisters were so close, they knew
exactly where to jab at each other's sensitive spots.  They're exactly
the same as they were eighteen years ago, she thought, when she first
went to live with Elinor.  But now, instead of cheerfully bickering
over hair ribbons or stolen pencils, they were quarrelling over a
fortune.

At the side of the pool, Clare said crossly, "Of all the unctuous,
hypocritical little creeps, you two are the worst!  I never realized
that your devotion to literature was so great, Annabel.  Scholarships,
prizes, and burs aries to perpetuate her life's work, indeed!"

"Well, why nod" Annabel cried.

"It's her money!  I wanted to cheer her up, after you'd been such a
bitch."

"Well, why not?"  Clare yelled.

"Because Gran's life's work has probably done more damage than she will
ever realize!"

Her sisters groaned theatrically: together, they mimicked Clare's high,
soft voice: "Those sentimental novels give women readers a romantic,
unrealistic, and dangerous view of LIFE."

"Well, they do," Clare said defensively.

"All those women readers have been taught to believe in happy endings.
If they're going through a tough period of life, they simply tell
themselves that they're in the middle of chapter five, but the hero
will be waiting, to put things right, in chapter seven.  They've been
indoctrinated to be passive, to put up with their lives, not to try and
change them."

"What's so terrible about escapist literature?"  Annabel demanded.

"Most women read it and why not?  I do."

"Gran's books sell by the million," Miranda said, "so obviously a great
many people enjoy them."  "Clare, why not check out your own reality,"
Annabel suggested, "and stop yelling at us because of your domestic
problems."

"That's probably why she's in such a foul mood," Miranda continued.

"I bet they've had a falling out, and she's temporarily disenchanted.
No longer believes in romance or true love."

"True love died out with pterodactyls," Clare said curtly.

"No it didn't.  But I'd like to know where to find it," Miranda
mused.

"That wonderful vibration between the two of you, "Annabel said
dreamily.

"That stars-in-your-heart feeling, when you don't need words to
communicate .. ."

"I've never met a man who knew what I was thinking," said Miranda, "and
if there's no need to communicate, how come you telephone New York so
often?  At Gran's expense.1 Exasperated, Clare said, "I really don't
understand how you two can chat so flippantly about any form of love or
communication after that hypocritical scene you just played.  I was
disgusted by your calculating flatteryP "And I was disgusted by your
squeaky self-righteousness!"  Miranda snapped.

"At least I didn't suddenly turn into a ]over of literature, like
Annabel!"

"I simply wanted to make her happy!"  Annabel shouted.

"After you had upset her."

"You know I can't stand her Daddy-knows-best line," Clare said.

"Who cares what you think, when she's dying, you self righteous little
prig!"  Miranda said angrily.

I Clare burst into tears and ran indoors.  Stumbling to her bedroom,
she wondered, as she had so many times, how Miranda could, with so few
words, goad her to feel such violence and passion.  Once again Miranda
had reduced her, to a point where she felt as though she were naked
and vulnerable, being mercilessly poked by an electric cattle prod.

The pool area was silent.

Buzz sighed.  She left her office and returned to Elinor's bedroom:
Buzz liked to appear there unexpectedly, to make sure that when her
back was turned, the nurse wasn't slack.

White and exhausted, Elinor lay against the pillows; one thin hand upon
the sheet clutched the silver-framed photograph of Billy as a young
flier.  She looked up at Buzz, and her face was frightened as she
whispered, "I'll soon see him again."

""Rubbish.  I'll have you back on your feet in no time," Buzz said
firmly.

"You don't understand about Billy, Buzz.  You never understood."

"I understand that Billy owed everything to you."

"Oh no, Buzz, I owed everything to Billy," Elinor whispered dreamily.

"He was the only marr for me right from the beginning..  ."

CHAPTER 3

TUESDAY, 15 OCTOBER 19 18

On night duty in the casualty clearing station at La Chapelle in
northern France, eighteen-year-old Nurse Elinor Dove was in love and
that, for the moment, was all that truly mattered.  It was the first
time she had experienced the intoxicating effect.

After that first night, when Billy had kissed her hand, Elinor blushed
whenever she had to go near bed 17; if he called for her, she tried to
avoid touching him.  Her nervousness seemed to amuse him, and the rest
of the ward.

One morning, just before she went off duty, Nurse Dove, exhausted, was
wearily scrubbing up the carnage from the previous day's many
operations.  Alone in the sink room, she suddenly heard a tapping sound
approaching from behind.  She turned to see Flight Commander O'Dare, on
rubber-tipped crutches, swing himself through the door.  Under his
aquamarine gaze, Elinor felt an all-too-familiar blush.  Why didn't
this fellow get back into his bed if he felt ill?  Why did he look at
her so steadily, with that hint of a smile?  Why did he make her feel
so warm and embarrassed and vulnerable?  And why did she feel guilty?
He knew he was making her blush.

"Why are you out of bed?"  she asked, feigning irritation.  He
grinned.

"You know I might be transferred soon," he said as he moved towards
her.  Suddenly one of his crutches slipped on the wet tiles and he lost
his balance, crashing to the floor.

Nurse Dove dashed to her patient.

"Don't move!  Let me help you!"

Carefully she turned him on his back, then gently felt his neck.

"Can you move your head to the left?  ... Now to the right ... That's
fine."  Billy O'Dare opened his aquamarine eyes, and in them, Nurse
Dove saw not pain but determination.  Without speaking, he gripped her
upper arms, pulling her down on his chest.  For a moment, he stared
into her eyes, mesmerizing her.  Then silently he pulled her closer and
fastened his warm mouth upon hers.  Once again she was overwhelmed by
the seductive, forbidden smell of him.

Lying on top of him, feeling his body beneath her, Elinor started to
tremble: an odd, compulsively strong urge seemed to knock all the sense
from her head.  Her eyes were closed.  She felt as if she were
pleasantly drowning in warm water, Then she felt the tip of his tongue
part her lips and gently explore her unresisting mouth as his hand
reached beneath her nurse's headdress to the thick fair hair coiled in
a bun at the nape of her neck.  Billy gently stroked the back of her
neck, and every time he did so, a shiver ran down her spine.  Through
her navy serge uniform, she felt his knowing hand on her breast, his
gentle touch warming her heart.

Elinor was oblivious of the ward noises around her.  As if of its own
volition, her body arched against Billy O'Dare.  His arms enfolded and
imprisoned her.  He kissed her harshly, bruising her lips against his.
His hand slid downwards to press her buttocks against him, and she felt
his hard body against hers.

She stiffened in alarm.  Between kisses, Billy murmured soothing words:
lovely creature ... wanted you the moment I saw you ... lovely eyes ...
love ... love ... love."  As he kissed her, one calculating hand slowly
raised her skirt and groped beneath it.

Nurse Dove sharply returned to reality.  Frantically she fought against
his insistent strong hands.  All the sensuous excitement evaporated,
turned off as if -by a switch.  She knew what happened to girls who let
a fellow go too far, and it wasn't going to happen to her.

Billy lay on the floor looking up at her, his eyes imploring.

"I'm sorry!  But you're so lovely, so special," he whispered.

Elinor scowled at him again, her pale green eyes flashing with
indignation.

"You don't understand how a fellow feels," Billy said reproachfully.

"Besides, Nurse Dove, I really do love you."  Two weeks later, somewhat
to his surprise, Flight Commander William O'Dare asked Nurse Elinor
Dove to marry him.

To Elinor's dismay, Buzz did not share her joy at Billy's proposal.

Sitting on Elinor's bed in the Nissen hut, Buzz eventually said, "You
know the dangers of wartime marriages, Nell.  There are so few women
out here ... their attractions are magnified .. and all the men fall
for them.  Even my- boot faced commandant has a string of beaux. 
Things get out of perspective on both sides."  She inhaled cigarette
smoke.

"I admit Billy's a good-looker.  Them blue eyes and that tangle of fair
hair.  I agree he's got plenty of lanky, twinkle eyed Irish charm.  But
what do you know about him, Nell?  You know nothing, except he's six
foot tall, good-looking and could charm the bloomers off practically
anyone.  Why get married so fast?  They say the war's nearly over, so
Billy's unlikely-6 get killed.  There's no hurry or so you tell me!"

"What a wet blanket you are!"  Elinor said crossly.

"What a romantic, headstrong idiot you are," Buzz retorted.

"You know nothing about his family, What's Billy going to do in
peacetime?  What will you live on?  Suppose 5The turns put to be a
lazy layabout or a rotter?  What if he turns out to be tricking you?"
"Tricking me?"  Elinor exclaimed indignantly.

"Why would Billy want to trick me?  I haven't got a bean!"

"I don't know," Buzz worried.

"I just think he's too good to be true.  If he's such a good bet, then
why not wait until you've met his family?"

"I've had enough of death and depression, and so has he!  I want some
life, and he's offering it to me."  Eighteen-year-old Elinor and her
twenty-five-year-old bridegroom were married by a French Catholic
priest in a church most of which was still standing five miles from the
hospital at La Chapelle.  Elinor wore her best cream silk blouse and a
borrowed burgundy wool skirt.  The marriage witnesses were Billy's
observer, Joe Grant, and Buzz, who wore a pink blouse and an air of
suspicion.

The newlyweds were given official permission to spend three nights in
the estaminet at La Chapelle.  After a wedding meal of red wine, rabbit
casserole, and a blackberry tart that cost Billy a fortune in
cigarettes, he led Elinor upstairs.

The bedroom, papered in bronze chrysanthemums, contained only a few
sticks of furniture; by the light of a flickering candle, Elinor saw a
large feather bed.  She looked away from it, partly out of
embarrassment, partly out of fear, and stood in the middle of the room,
still, stiff, and silent.

Billy grinned at his bride, opened a second bottle of wine, and
unbuttoned his tunic.

Elinor was hypnotically aware of Billy's musky smell and the light blue
flash of his eyes as he lifted her in his arms.  Without speaking, he
carried her to the bed and laid her on the quilt.  He pushed her skirts
up, then slowly slipped off her shoes.  Next he removed her blue satin
garters and peeled silk stockings from her pale legs.

kissed her bare feet, sliding his tongue between her and licked them.
His kisses crept up her plump S. Elinor lay rigid with embarrassment.
Billy untied the drawstring of her bloomers and felt low; softly he
stroked her navel, then moved downward.  lowly he pulled down the
bloomers, until Elinor's white y and blonde hair were revealed to him.
Impeded above her waist by a wrinkled mess of clothing, ""Elinor felt
trapped and alarmed.  She clamped her eyes shut as her entire body
blushed with shame.  Even though Billy was moving slowly, it all seemed
to be happening so fast.

Carefully, cares singly Billy unbuttoned her blouse, then unbuckled the
belt from her narrow waist and removed her skirt.  He pulled the string
of her underskirt and lifted off her chemise.  When, finally, she was
completely undressed, Billy paused to touch her breasts and lightly
pinch her nipples, just enough to excite her.

Still Elinor kept her eyes shut.  Had they been open, she would have
seen Billy undress like an eight-armed Indian god, hurling his clothes
to the floor.

Billy was fascinated by the whiteness of Elinor's skin as she lay naked
in the soft, golden candlelight.  He was enchanted by her heavy,
beige-tipped breasts and the slender waist below it, which then swelled
again to a rounded belly, above pale thighs.

In the quiet candlelit room, there was no sound, not even of breathing.
Elinor was so tense she could not draw a breath.

Billy laughed and whispered, "You are a beautiful and voluptuous woman.
I'm going to make you realize that and enjoy it before the night is
over."

Again he began to caress her slowly, his eyes open to watch her
reactions: the soft, fleshy mysteries of a woman's sensuality were no
secret to Billy.

Elinor shrank from her bridegroom, squirming slightly beneath his
touch.  Her head tried to pretend that it didn't know what was
happening to her body.

He tickled her stomach with his moustache and slipped his tongue into
her navel and then licked upward until she f8t his breath scented by
her own body against her lips; to her, it tasted scandalous.

Gently he breathed into her ears and her mouth.  His lips sucked at her
eyelids, her cheeks, her chin, and her lips; his tongue tickled her
white throat.  Softly he bit at her breasts, then her buttocks.  Inch
by inch, his hands and his mouth discovered her body, leaving no secret
place unfound.  Subordinating his pleasure to hers, Billy slowly led
her into a new and thrilling but frightening world.

She felt his fingers travelling delicately over all of her body ...
touching, probing, sliding into every shadowed crevice, until his hand
finally moved towards the division of her thighs.  At the bottom of her
triangle of blonde hair, his index finger located the little bump no
bigger than a pea and he started, gently and rhythmically, to rub it.

Slowly Elinor relaxed.  Her body surrendered to the pleasure of Billy's
touch; it seemed to melt, no longer controlled by her' and then it
lifted, taut as a bow beneath his fingers, and her spirit soared.

Panting, bewildered, she opened her eyes.  Above her, in the
candlelight, she saw Billy's smiling, triumphant face.

"That's only the begirming," he promised.

"Now let's have a look at you."  He bent his head towards her belly,
and his fingers slipped between her legs.

"Open your legs," he whispered.

Elinor stiffened at this command, so totally contrary to her strict
upbringing.

"Please," Billy insisted.

His strength demanded her submission.  She must surrender this, and
with it her moral responsibility.  Had she not just promised to love,
honour, and obey him?  6o Quivering as she moved her legs slightly
apart, Elinor felt timid and guilty; her heart pounded with anxiety.
She felt unbearably vulnerable.

Slowly she parted her legs.  Billy's interest seemed curiously
objective, and his eyes narrowed at the corners, as if he were a
connoisseur examining a hothouse orchid, an exotic flower surrounded by
pale pink, fleshy leaves and nestled in a soft blonde bird's nest.

Carefully he pushed her lips apart and continued his clinical
exploration.  He lowered his head and licked her, until once again
Elinor's body ignored her mind and ecstasy triumphed over shame.

Billy raised his head and looked up at her.

"Now admit that it isn't so bad," he muttered as he slipped his hand,
between her thighs.

By the time his hand reached its goal, Elinor was once more quivering
with fear.  Billy's fingers softly probed her moist warmth until his
middle finger met less resistance.  Insistent, he pushed.  Eventually
his finger found the small opening and worked its way inside, enlarging
it, with minimal pain to his bride.  Elinor whimpered as he won his
gentle battle.

At first she felt panic as he entered her.  With his body stretched
upon her, Billy lay still and reassured her with gentle kisses until
she relaxed.

"Like this," he whispered, and his hands twisted her hips in a circular
motion.

Slowly her body took up the motion.  In silence, Billy controlled each
movement, each twist.  Limbs entangled, they writhed in a leisurely,
horizontal dance as they explored each other.  Through the night, they
slid from one side of the feather bed to the other, sometimes moving
slowly, sometimes lunging swiftly, as their hunger for each other
mounted and then was satisfied, only to grow again.

At times, he crouched above her like some great triumphant beast,
looking down on his conquest spread out Wow him.

She felt that the entire world existed only as a vague two-dimensional
blur.  Only their crumpled nest of pillows and sheets, and the pungent
male body on top of her sliding, slipping, thrusting inside her were
sharply in focus, three-dimensional, and real.  She could not think
beyond this erotic joining of their flesh in the dimly shadowed,
voluptuous bed, perfumed by their bodies.

Sometimes he lay beneath her, cradling her breasts in his hands,
feeling her soft flesh quiver against his lips, and she sat panting
upon his stomach as his strong hands held and rotated her hips.  He
gripped her to control her movements, so she could not move as she
wished, could not move except as he wished.

At first she had' demurely crossed her arms to hide her breasts, but
eventually, flinging her arms high in abandon, she rode him like a
plunging dolphin, until she fell forward, exhausted, and her breasts
rubbed against the damp hair of his chest.

By morning, her flesh was bruised in places, like an overripe pear, and
these pale contusions marked her as the property of Billy as surely as
a cattle brand.

She was besotted, enchanted, in love, completely in Billy's thrall.
Like lightning, he excited, frightened, and fascinated her.

That morning, momentarily disoriented, Elinor sleepily lifted her head
from the pillow.  Then she remembered the night, and she buried her
face in the bedclothes.  Her face grew hot as she recalled how Billy
had manipulated her senses and rendered her boneless and helpless
beneath his touch.

Then she realized that, in the billowing warmth, of the feather bed,
she could feel no body next to hers.

She sat up.  Billy her husband was leaning out of the open window.  He
was stark naked.  For a moment, Elinor looked through lowered eyelashes
at his cropped fair hair, his strong neck, his long back; she gazed
admiringly at his long, lean legs the left foot still bandaged and his
muscular buttocks, so different from her soft, pliable flesh.
Throughout her life, this private peek at Billy's body was frozen in
her mind, and at the memory, Elinor would melt, and forgive him
anything.

During the first weeks of her marriage, Elinor slid slowly, agreeably,
voluptuously into sensuality.

What had originally attracted Billy to Elinor as much as her beauty and
exuberant energy was the innocence that she had protected so firmly,
and to which Billy had responded with classic male determination.

Having destroyed that innocence, Billy now sought to artificially
rebuild it, for the pleasure of again breaching it.  At first Elinor
refused to re-enact her timid virginity so that Billy could theft
pretend to break her in as he had on their wedding night.

"Why can't we undress before we go to bed, as usual?  don't understand
why you want me to play-act," she protested.  But then she grew to
enjoy his little fantasy.

Dexterously, swiftly, Billy turned his bride into a slave of her own
eroticism.  She could think about nothing else.  She was still at heart
a farm girl, and in bed, Billy encouraged her impudent flirtatious ness
her adolescent awkwardness, clumsiness, blushing and innocent
corruptibility.  To Billy's young and unsophisticated bride, this
physical passion her adoring proof of love and devotion to her husband
came as an undreamed-of surprise.  In bed with Billy, Elinor shook and
trembled and sobbed until she was exhausted, until she felt overwhelmed
and ecstatically weary.

EV Icry time r felt herself fall, Billy touched her, Elino
Simlintdizzily inta a void.  When he raised his eyelids and the intense
blue light of his eyes flashed straight at her, Elinor always caught
her breath.  When Billy spoke to her as a prelude to love, his voice
would deepen, holding a silken note of promise and of threat.  His
voice alone could make Elinor's legs tremble.  And when, in this voice
that reminded her of dark honey, he called her name, she felt his mouth
caress her without touching her.  So vivid was the sensation that she
was astonished that other people in the room did not notice it,
especially when the newlyweds visited his family.

Without being told, Elinor knew that, for her, sex alone could never be
fulfilling.  The abandonment of her body had to be combined with the
passion in her heart and the devotion in her soul.  For her, such a
feeling of complete, abandoned love was possible with no man except
Billy.  Only he knew when to coax, when to tempt, when to insist.  He
was the only man to whom she could trust her body.  She knew
instinctively that there would never be another man for her.

After being shown by a maid to an impressively large bedroom, Elinor
turned, grinning, to her husband and asked, "Why didn't you tell meT
Billy took her into his arms, tilted her chin up, and kissed
her-tenderly.

"It would only have made you nervous.

Better you see for yourself what my family are like."

"But why didn't you say your folks were rich?"

Elinor asked.

"Because they aren' tV Billy laughed.

"Look how threadbare this carpet is.  See how shabby the curtains are.
You'll soon feel the dams in the sheets.  And wait until you taste the
sherry!"

"Then how come they live as if they are rich?  And what about the
silver and the servant sT "My father lost most of his inheritance
through unwise investments, the silver's only plate, and there aren't
really as many servants as there used to be; the ones that remain
aren't paid much and they eat food grown here on the estate."  Elinor
shook her head.  She was truly in a foreign land.  It defied all logic.
Here was a penniless family, living in a house stuffed with servants,
in which elaborate meals were served and all the women wore pearl
necklaces.  Yet, as Billy explained, it was impossible to find a stamp,
or anything else that had to be paid for with cash.

"And why did the man in black call your mother "milady'T Elinor
asked.

"Because my father is a baronet."

"You mean he's a lord?"  "Nothing so grand.  I'll explain the English
class system to you someday when I have the strength and the time.
Believe me, it truly isn't important to us.  For now, let's forget it.
Besides, we mustn't be late for dinner.  It's the one thing my mother
never forgives."  That night, after dinner, a maid helped the
embarrassed Elinor to undress.  Lying in a four-poster bed with blue
brocade curtains, Elinor watched her bedside candle's hypnotic flicker.
As she waited for Billy to appear, she mentally reviewed the events of
the long day.

As nervous as any bride about to meet her mother-inlaw for the first
time, Elinor had been tense with apprehension as the pony and trap
trotted from the station through a marzipan-coloured, curving land of
brown and green.  Suddenly, across open parkland, she had seen what
looked like a grey Greek temple nestled in trees, and Billy had said in
an offhand voice, "That's Larkwood."  Already overawed, Elinor had
followed the butler into the drawing room, where a group of
tweed-suited, staring people were gathered around a fireplace at the
far end of the dark room.  Even at a distance, Elinor realized that she
was about to undergo some sort of test; she was so nervous that she was
unable to link names with relationships until much later except for
Billy's mother, a faded version of Billy, who brushed Elinor's cheek
with a hint of a kiss.

Later at dinner, there was a lot of political talk that Elinor didn't
understand.  She sat next to Billy's father, and followed his example
when picking up' the silver cutlery that surrounded her plate; it was
the first time she had eaten a pear with a knife and fork.

Now, lying in bed, Elinor longed for Billy to, appear and reassure her
of his love, because clearly his family felt none for her.  Where was
Billy?  Elinor slipped from her bed and quietly opened the door.  Then
she froze as she heard her name.

Outside, on the landing, she heard Billy's mother speak angrily of her
new daughter-in-law with words that hurt and angered Elinor.

"It's perfectly clear why you married.  her, darling.  She is a very
good-looking girl and, luckily, she has that charming American accent.
But perhaps you might tell her in the most tactful way, of course that
she really cannot sit at my dinner table and say nothing: she must
learn to talk, to listen, to sparkle."

"She sparkles enough when she's feeling confident," Billy said.

"I think you might all be a little more patient and generous-spirited.
Whether you like it or not, Elinor is now part of this family."

"Ali!  That's the point.  This is some sort of punishment for me, isn't
it?  Heaven knows what I have done to deserve it except not give birth
to you first!  Don't you think it's a little unkind to have married
someone out of your class, Billy?"

, .  I'm penniless, I have no prospects, I'm slightly disabled, and I
can't get a job, Mother.  What sort of class does that .  ?I put me
in.

"You know you can always live here."

"And watch Madorie count each mouthful of her husband's inheritance
that we consume?  No thank you!"

With that, Billy turned and entered the bedroom.  He found Elinor
staring tearfully at her reflection in the cheval mirror.

"Oh, Billy, I feel so sad ... I so much wanted your family to like
me."

"Don't be silly.  The family thinks you're a corker."  He stood behind
her and pulled her body against him, his arms encircling her, his hands
caressing the thin fabric that covered her breasts.

Elinor knew, however, that she had not misinterpreted what she
overheard.  She felt hurt, inadequate, and inferior in this nest of
effortless superiority.  And for the first time in a very long while,
Elinor was aware of just how far away from home she was.

Billy slipped her nightgown from her shoulders, but for once Elinor did
not immediately respond to his lovemaking.  She was overcome by
indignation.  She was an

American who had just survived a war, and she had earned her place in
the world.  She was not about to be put down by these out-of-date,
supercilious, upper-class Britishers of unearned privilege.  They
regarded her as inferior because she came of humble folk who worked
with their hands.  Well, she would show them.

But Elinor was unaware of the degree to which her bullying father had
conditioned her, and how this would adversely affect her future, and
her ability to show them.

Even after they were comfortably settled in their own flat, Billy
visited his home as often as possible.  For him, it was a place of
security, a refuge from a world that made demands he was not yet ready
to face  None the less, he obviously Ot himself to be anybody's equal;
Elinor wished she could be as comfortable and secure as he seemed, in
the presence Of the O'Dare family.

"I feel I'm not as good as them," she confided to Billy as, on a
subsequent visit to Larkwood, they lay in bed, "and sometimes I suspect
they want me to feel like this."  "They doll't mean to embarrass you,
old girl," Billy comforted her as he stroked her body.

"You just aren't used to our offhand English ways."

"But I only feel this way with them," Elinor puzzled.

"I feel comfortable and equal to anyone at school."  Elinor now
attended evening classes at the polytechnic, hoping that an improved
education would enable her to hold her own more easily against Billy's
standoffish family.

"And so you are," Billy murmured, caressing' her pale flesh.  ret
understand," Elinor sighed.

"Because you can "You do Wn anywhere."  hold your 0 But Elinor was
wrong.  True, Billy was an educated, well-mannered gentleman, handsome,
sensual, and possessed of animal grace.  He had experienced life's
abundance and assumed it would continue, for he knew that he was
intelligent and clever.  What he did not know, or could never ado lit
was how very lazy he was.

Indeed, to all appearances, Billy was a sophisticated man-about-town
who knew the ways of the world.  Before the war" he had already made an
impression in the drawing rooms and ballrooms of London as a charming
young fellow and a polished conversationalist.

In the masculine world of London's clubs, however, Billy had projected
a different image.  There it was recognized that the sexes had clearly
defined and different purposes: Men shared sport and danger; they
gambled and provided other with companionship and conversation.  Women
sexual pleasure, children, and home comfort.  In these clubs, Billy had
not been considered the equal of his respected father and elder
brother; rather, he was rumoured to be unreliable and unscrupulous
dangerously close to a cad with perhaps too practised an eye for a
pretty ankle.  Jealous men referred to him as a 'ladies" man" For his
part, Billy remained impervious to their remarks; he seemed to feel it
was his duty in life to charm all women, debutantes and married women
alike  His selfconfidence appeared unassailable.

in prewar London's plush bordellos, Billy's careless generosity, his
atypical concern for the sexual fulfilment of his partner, his
voluptuous exploits, and his sometimes delicate, sometimes harsh
exploration of human flesh had also made him a favourite of expensive
whores.  For Billy, sexual pleasure consisted not only of lust but of
frivolity, licentious play, and a perverse, detached curiosity.  He was
as inventive and imaginative as he was unscrupulous, as adventurous as
he was amoral.  He was almost irresistible in bed.

Postwar London, however, was different, especially for a penniless
married man.

At first Billy had no anxiety about his future.  His wonderful,
get-rich-quick schemes were put to Elinor with such confidence that,
for a short time, she believed in them.  Gradually, though, she
realized that the mercurial Billy incautious and impractical, feckless
and immature was not the stuff from which successful self-employed
businessmen were fashioned.  Finally he tried to find a job, but could
not get one.

Still, they had to have a home, and in Earls Court Square Billy found a
cheap, shabby, two-room apartment with one communal bathroom.

"It will do for a few weeks," he said.  Elinor, with a newlywo's
enthusiasm, tried to make the depressing flat into a comfortable home.
She seemed to be able to do little, however, to improve the
increasingly depressed spirits of her husband or to shore up
his.rapiddly eroding self-confidence.

One morning, six months after the war had ended, Elinor, still in her
teens and now pregnant, lay in bed and watched as Billy shaved.  She
was bewildered and distressed by the transformation of the assertive,
devil-may-care air ace she had married into a man who grew more and
more bitter and morose, who seemed mired in apathy, frozen in a state
of anxious despair.  She wanted to reach out and comfort him, to try to
reassure him, but she knew she dared not.

"You might stop looking at me so reproachfully!"  Billy said, catching
Elinor's eye in his shaving mirror.

"Honey, I'm only a little concerned.  You seem so tired."  Already she
had learned not to say more.

What Elinor wanted to say to Billy was, "We are alive, aren't we?  We
aren't about to be blown to bits at any moment.  And we surely won't
starve so long as there's food to feed the family servants at
Larkwood!"  And they had each other, didn't they?  Surely she and Billy
could enjoy being together, able to comfort each other and cheer each
other's spirits when life was tough.  Wasn't that the whole point of
being married being loving and protective and struggling together
through the hard times?  That was a lot more important than sailing
through the sunny days.

Elinor still failed to understand that Billy, the golden boy, so brave
and dauntless as a sky fighter, was uniquely unprepared for life's real
and continuing battles.  There he proved himself to be not only a
dispirited and disheartened, combatant but a bad loser as well.

Billy looked into his own eyes, reflected in the shaving mirror, In
that same mirror he had watched his face develop from a handsome lad's
into that of a self-confident man.  Gradually, however, since the war,
since he had mar Elinor that splendid male hero had been replaced gance
anxiety" soon followed by desperation, as Billy searched unsuccessfully
for his place in the postwar world.  His failure left him feeling
ashamed, emasculated, bereft of selfrespect.  What had gone wrong?  He
really had been a golden boy, and he still couldn't quite believe that
he had been abandoned by the gods.  They had smiled upon him so
indulgently for the early part of his life, given him his privileged
background, his good looks and fine body.  Surely they had guided and
protected him as an air ace?  He had not only survived, he had been
called a hero.

But now the gods seemed indifferent, abandoning him to this postwar
purgatory.  where heroes were two a penny and there were no jobs.

Billy had originally tried to get a job that involved aeroplanes but so
had every other ex-flier, and many did not have the disadvantage of an
injury.  It was ironic that so few flying jobs should be available,
when Billy was certain that aviation to carry mail and even, perhaps,
passengers was one of the few industries that could be expected to
expand rapidly.

But there were just no jobs for him, and Billy found it humiliating.
How was it that he couldn't manage what was surely the basic
requirement of a man to care for his wife and family?  Observing the
frustration reflected in Billy's face, Elinor considered how fortunate
it was that she knew one surefire way to bolster his self-confidence.

In bed, Billy was in charge of their world.  There, he regained, if
only fleetingly, a sense of potency something that seemed to be
inexorably dissolving from the rest of his life.  Making love, he felt
the power that he knew was his due.

As Billy stropped his razor, Elinor lay back in the bed and stretched
languorously.  She smiled at her husband.

Mver-swn,anyone with eyes like yours they're the 'colour of sea water
over white sand; they shine with secrets.

No wonder all the nurses fell for you.  But I was the lucky one."  in
the shaving mirror, his eyes met Elinor's and he smiled.  Billy
recognized her invitation.  He wiped the lather from his cheeks and
turned towards the bed.

With each month of Elinor's pregnancy, Billy's disposition worsened.
She, of course, worried that her husband's changed attitude was due to
her increasing inability to provide the full sexual involvement he
needed.  In truth, Elinor could never provide what Billy needed, which
was self-respect.

At first Billy seemed merely sullen.  Gradually he became volatile,
short-tempered, sarcastic, and deliberately unkind.  Elinor became more
and more disconcerted, eventually immobilized by her own confusion.
What had become of the man who had made love so real, indeed almost
tangible?  The loss of his affection so depressed her that it became an
effort to do anything.  A year earlier, she would not have put up with
such behaviour, but rebellion was now the last thing on her mind
because, quite simply, Billy and pregnancy had knocked it out of her.
Little by little, Elinor7s vivacity, bounce, and drive were submerged,
buried in despair.

Almost childlike in his determined self-absorption, Billy became
Elinor's master.  If he wanted her to do something, she knew she was
expected to drop whatever she was doing and turn her attention to him;
otherwise he sulked.  Billy also attempted to overcome his insecurity
by subtly reminding Elinor that he had the education, the worldly
experience and knowledge that she, as a woman, lacked.  He attacked her
humble background, and once introduced her to a male friend as his
"American bumpkin'.  Billy enjoyed her helplessness and her inability
to stand up to his glib, facile, verbal cruelty.

Elinor watched Billy struggle with his demons as, bewildered and
frustrated, he increasingly sought oblivion in drink.  And whenever he
drank, the dashing, popular charmer became aggressive and maudlin,
occasionally even abusing her verbally.  On the day after a drinking
bout, however, Billy would always be childlike in his remorse,
relentless in his contrition, and he was always both hurt and
astonished if Elinor did not forgive him immediately.

By being wistfully contrite and then making her laugh, Billy could coax
and wheedle his wife into doing anything he wanted.  On the rare
occasion when that ploy didn't work, Billy would withdraw in sullen
temper: immediately anxious, Elinor always crumpled before his
projected disapproval.  Sometimes Billy would become exasperated by her
timidity; sometimes he found it erotic.  Invariably these episodes
ended the same way, for he was always forgiven in bed.

But in the long run, nothing really worked.  because nothing fully
erased Billy's sense of failure and of despair.

Feeling powerless outside his home, Billy compensated by being
dictatorial within it.  Like the chairman who snarls at his secretary,
like the secretary who snaps at the office boy, who then kicks the cat,
Billy externalized his anxiety upon the only person willing, to put up
with his bullying his wife.  He was contemptuous of her meek acceptance
of his bad behaviour.

But Elinor had learned from her mother, who had humbly accepted her
husband's tyranny, that authority was a masculine concept.  Vaguely she
understood that a bearded God possessed ultimate power in the universe,
before which everyone bowed down; the equivalent domestic power was a
husband.  From her mother, Elinor had learned that every woman needed a
man and a shouting bully was better than no man at all- At least,
Elinor comforted herself, Billy never walloped her, as her father had
done; at least life could never be as terrifying as it had been when
she was young.

Then, one Sunday, Billy didn't turn up for the major meal of the week
until mid-afternoon after the pubs had closed.  Elinor took the
dried-out leg of lamb from the oven and placed it on the table.

"That's not fit to cat," Billy said.  He grabbed the joint of meat and
threw it at the wall.

As Elinor stared at the greasy, dark stains and the gravy dripping
down, she remembered another time.  She had been helping her ma to
prepare their Thanksgiving dinner.  Eleven-year-old Nell had slapped
her small brother's fingers away from the cranberry sauce and Paul had
yelled in protest as their father came in from the barn.

Seeing his son's tears, Marius jumped forward and boxed young Elinor's
ears.  As he turned to comfort Paul, Nell crept towards the door.
Marius yanked her back.

"And where do you think you're going?"  he roared, then pulled off his
leather belt, sat down, shoved Nell over his knee, and roughly pulled
down her drawers..

"It wasn't Nell's fault!  Don't spoil our Thanksgiving!"  her ma cried,
but he took no notice.  As always when he strapped her, Nell howled
with pain.  Her ma burst into tears and ran from the kitchen.

"There, see what you've done!"  Marius shouted at Nell.

"Now you've spoiled our Thanksgiving!"  From the kitchen table, he
picked up the platter of turkey and hurled it at the dresser. 
Quivering with fear, Nell watched the grease and gravy drip down and
form a puddle on the floor ... Now, Elinor found herself quivering with
the same fear as she watched the gravy dribbling down the wall.  In
silent apprehension, she heard Billy slam the front door.  She refused
to admit to herself that she had chained herself to another bully, but
Billy's behaviour made Elinor feel as hopeless and inadequate asher
father's had when she was a girl.  Increasingly she dreaded Billy's
disapproval, his growing coldness and contempt, and his lacerating
sarcasm.  And her dread merely seemed to make him feel the more
superior.

So Elinor remembered how to be stoical.  When nervous and timid, she
reapplied her childhood techniques of willing herself to be
inconspicuous, fading into the background; anaesthetizing her mind to
the brutality of her father; her anxious passivity made her an easy
victim.

Gradually all Elinor's frightened responses resurfaced, having lain
dormant during the war, when courage and determination had overridden
her other characteristics.

Just as Elinor's father had dominated her childhood with his violent
and unquestioned parental authority, so when Billy demanded obedience,
she almost always did as he told her without resistance.

Billy especially enjoyed his ability to dominate Elinor sexually.  He
used sex to thrill, to control, and to comfort her although never to
reassure her, because Billy knew that an uncertain woman is always
obedient, whereas a self-confident woman might want her own way.  After
their son was born, Billy expanded his powers of sexual mastery; he
enjoyed seeing how quickly or how excruciatingly slowly he could
produce her climax.  His rampant masculinity was reinforced by the
knowledge that whenever he pleased, he could, sometimes with careful
cruelty or unexpected kindness, reduce Elinor to a trembling,
acquiescent creature at the mercy of her own flesh.

Although she did not realize it, Elinor enjoyed this abnegation of all
responsibility, sexual and otherwise, to her domineering, overpowering,
excitingly threatening husband.  For her, Billy held the dangerous,
sensual excitement of a wild animal that had been domesticated yet
never tamed.  There was a threat in everything he did, and she never
sensed it more than when they made love.  Even when their financial
situation began to improve, his sexual hold on her did not change.

Eventually, in 1921, through the influence of a family friend, Billy
was hired as a society gossip writer on the Daily Globe, a London
newspaper.  It was a job that suited him perfectly, for Billy's Irish
gift of the gab meant that he could talk to anyone about anything; his
outward cheerful ebullience put everyone at ease, dnd his charm and
sympathetic demeanour those journalist's weapons lowered all social
drawbridges.  But, although Billy attended all the smart parties, he
knew as did the other guests that between him and them lay a fine which
could not be crossed, for Billy was -present as a paid servant, a hired
hack.

Elinor, of course, never accompanied Billy to these functions, and in
truth she did not want to: that was his world, not hers.  To her, the
only real drawback to Billy's new job was that he was never at home in
the evenings, except on Sunday.  Also, one of the side effects of his
employment seemed to be a permanent hangover, but nevertheless Elinor
was certain this situation had to be a better one for Billy; she did
not realize the sense of humiliation he felt at being an outsider in
the world to which he had been born.  She only sensed the relief that
he was now working, and that it was no longer necessary to borrow money
from his old friend, Joe Grant, now an articled clerk to a firm of
London solicitors.

Elinor suspected that Bill y who never wrote anything longer than a
frivolous paragraph if he could avoid it actually could write serious
articles if he wanted to do so.  One of his colleagues also told her
that Billy had the makings of a good theatre critic, but he did not
care to subject himself to the concentration necessary to write the
review in his head as he watched a play.  Billy, who did not like hard
work, preferred to amuse himself at the theatre, and ,."!kfterwards in
restaurants, at fashionable dinner parties, or at the.  daring new
nightclubs.

Once, Billy had been a man with high expectations and high ambition,
known by everyone; now, although he knew everyone, he seemed to be
nobody's friend.  It was clear to him that he was going nowhere.  As a
result, his smiles and his charm were reserved almost exclusively for
the people he saw when he was on the town.  At home, he wore his
depression like a cloak and only rarely allowed any warmth or humour to
show through.

In spite of all this, Elinor managed to be happy.  She loved living in
a big city with all of its conveniences.  She cleaned and cooked, she
cuddled her baby son, Edward, and she borrowed romantic novels from the
local penny library: these books in which the heroines never wore
second-hand clothes, and the heroes were as considerate as they were
handsome had provided her with precious hours of escape from the
anxieties.  of life she had known when pregnant, with Billy out of
work. Now Elinor read romantic fiction while waiting for Billy'to come
home, because she could never get to sleep until he lay safe beside
her.

On one occasion, when he slammed the door of their bedroom at four
o'clock in the morning, Elinor whispered, "Don't make a noise!  You'll
wake the baby!  Where have you been?"  "Stop nagging," Billy yawned as
he removed the studs from his evening shirt.

"What do you mean, nagging?"  Elinor whispered indignantly.

"I mean your constant criticism, your silent hurt looks of reproach,
your unreasonable demands," Billy said, pulling off his socks.

"This sock needs mending."  He peered at it somewhat drunkenly.

For once, Elinor decided to give full vent to her true feelings.  She
hopped out of bed and stood angrily in front of Billy, her legs apart,
her hands on her hips, her body hardly hidden by a flimsy
peach-coloured nightgown and robe.

"How can you be so unfair?"  she asked in a low voice.

"Wouldn't you want to know where I had been if I went out and left you
at home every night?"  Billy turned slowly and looked intently at his
wife.  He stared at her shadowed breasts, glanced at his watch,
grinned, and moved towards her.

As his right hand slid beneath the peach chiffon, Elinor felt her
nipples harden; immediately her body betrayed her and her anger melted
away, As his lips caressed her ear, her neck, her senses swirled; their
argument was forgotten.

Billy murmured, "Have you got it in?"  Shortly after Edward's birth, he
had sent Elinor to the shop in Holloway where Dr.  Marie Stopes gave
free advice and cheap contraception to women.

"Yes."  Now he'd know that she had been hoping.

With one hand, Billy pushed his discarded clothes from the bed and with
the other, he pulled Elinor's body to his.  Her kimono fell from her
shoulders to the floor, and she felt his warmth and strength against
her.

As he lowered her to the bed, she pushed down the thin straps of her
nightgown.

"No, don't take it off," he murmurdd, and touched her breasts with the
tip of his tongue.

His right hand stroked her thighs, then felt beneath the taut peach
gauze ... Where was the damn thing?  He located her tiny clitoris, felt
it harden beneath his thumb.

"Lie on top of me," he ordered.

"Now spread your legs, wide."  That way she climaxed so much quicker.

Elinor could not bear her husband's displeasure.  One Sunday evening,
after Billy had complained that she didn't iron his shirts well enough,
she cooked his favourite dish for dinner.  Afterwards, her finger
traced his cheek, her usual delicate signal to him.

,7 Billy frowned slightly and jerked his head away.  At first,
instinctively, Elinor wondered what she had done wrong.  Then she
wondered why she should feel guilty.  There were, of course, no
answers.  Whatever the cause, his rejection of her timid sexual advance
made her feel ashamed of being so forward.

Billy grinned to himself.  His disapproval always bewildered Elinor and
always brought her quickly to heel.

Some days later, when Elinor had had time to reflect on the incident,
she decided to try the same thing with him.  When Billy touched her
breast, she flinched slightly; she wanted to see if his reactions were
the same as hers.

Billy laughed at her refusal.  He lifted her into his arms and carried
her to the bed.  Silently and deliberately he undressed her, button by
button.

Resolutely determined w resist him, Elinor would not be wooed.  When he
laid her on the sheet, she did not move, willing herself to be
passively still.

Kneeling, Billy slowly pushed his knee between her legs and forced them
apart.  He felt her, quivering and moist, beneath him.

"You see, it's no use," he said.

"I know when you want me."  He took her especially harshly that time,
and when she whimpered, the face above her smiled.

"You've got to learn who's boss," Billy said softly, pinching her
nipples a little too hard.

Although their erotic life was still one of intense passion, some of
Billy's requirements puzzled Elinor.  In bed, Billy preferred a
half-dressed woman to a naked one, and he liked her to wear thick black
stockings like those of a schoolgirl rather than her best silk pair.

One summer evening, Billy returned home with a gift box for Elinor.
Inside, she found a white smock and a plain pinafore.

"Oh, Billyl" she cried in confused disappointment.

"Surely you don't expect me to wear this!  It's the sort of thing I
wore when I was a little girl and wore my hair in braids."

"Then braid your hair," Billy said evenly.

"But"

"That's enough!  If you want to please me braid your hair."

"No, I won't."

"Then I shall go to someone who will."  Billy left the room,
whistling.

He returned at six o'clock the next mo ming his step unsteady, his
speech slurred, his clothes reeking of the sour, sharp smell of whisky
and stale tobacco.  On his skin, Elinor detected the strong scent of
perfume.  Her eyes registered a look of hurt and bewilderment.

Billy laughed.

"Well, you didn't want me."  All day, Elinor hugged her baby to her and
wept with shame and grief.

Billy did not touch her for a month.  During that month, Elinor's
nipples ached to feel him; her belly longed to feel his fingernails
scrape lightly across it, before.  his hand slipped knowingly between
her thighs.  Alone, restless, and unable to sleep, she tossed in their
big brass marital bed; she banged pillows into shape, tortured by
mental pictures of Billy doing all those private things to someone
else.

On the fourth Sunday evening of her enforced celibacy, Elinor timidly
entered the living room and stood before Billy.  She was dressed in the
white smock, the pinafore, and the thick black stockings; her hair was
in braids.

"Do you like iff she asked him shyly.

Later, she remembered her surprise at the passion unleashed by that
pinafore as, on their bed, his hand groped beneath the tangle of her
childish clothes.

This seduction of innocence or the pretence of it 8o to be Ithe core of
Billy's sexual pleasure, providing energy that fired his loins with
greatest power.  Gradu- 'ally their relationship grew from that of a
man and a woman to that of a calculating seducer with a trusting child,
for Elinor.  was now also expected to behave like a submissive child
bride outside the bedroom.  In public, Billy now liked her to appear
submissive and deferential; dutifully passive, with head bowed, she
looked meek and acquiescent, but both she and Billy knew the secret
passion that lay behind her lowered eyes.

Only once more did Elinor protest at being dressed as a child. Standing
ready for bed, wearing only a white frilled pinafore and long black
stockings, she said hesitantly, "Billy, I don't mind dressing like this
sometimes, but must I do it always?  We never seem to do anything
else!"

"And why not?"  Billy lay on his back, both arms behind his head. 
Elinor looked at the blond hair glinting in his pale armpits and on his
upper chest; below the nipples, his body was hidden by rumpled
sheets.

"Because ... because ... I feel you're behaving like a strict father
with his little daughter ... and that would be wrong, wouldn't it,
Billy?"

"It would certainly be incestuous."  Billy stretched his arms in a
yawn.

"But what does a little more corruption matter?"  "Corruption?"

Elinor stared.

"Certainly," Billy said.

"The delights of the flesh to which you are so addicted are viewed by
the world as corrupt behaviour.  Ask any decent woman."

"What do you mean?  Surely what we do is normal between a man and his
wife?"  "Normal?  You know perfectly well, Elinor, that ladies, find
the sexual act distasteful.  The things that you and I get up to are
considered unspeakably degrading, and would shock any decent women." He
laughed.

"No respectable woman enjoys the sexual act only whores."

"But ... but ... you showed me all those things."  Because you clearly
enjoyed them, my dear.  You always wanted what I offered.  I did
nothing against your will.  You clearly have the heart of a whore.  You
enjoyed every perversion that I.offered you.  You positively shook
every time I touched you.  You love it all."

"But ... what are these perversion sT Slowly and deliberately Billy
listed the acts of eroticism in which he had encouraged his wife to
participate, clearly enjoying her confusion.

He smiled again.

"Don't worry, Elinor.  I enjoy your depravity.  But we'd better keep it
a secret, hadn't weT "Depravity?"  Elinor stammered.

He laughed.

"I think you're more depraved than I am, darling.  But if you don't
agree, then why don't we ask other people for their opinions."  Her
frightened expression aroused him so much that he carefully repeated
his accusation.  Observing Elinor's guilty, crimson face, Billy
suspected that in the future he would be able to manipulate his wife in
any way he wished, and get her to agree to do anything he requested,
simply by hurling this suggestion at her.

Elinor was simply unable to resist the temptations offered by Billy.
And of course, she did not dare resist, although she now felt bitterly
ashamed of the physical desires of her body and her willing
capitulation to Billy's domination.  With some success, she made
excuses to herself.  I didn't want to do it, but Billy made me do it,
and he's my husband, and I must obey him.

Tom between her pleasure and the resultant shame, Elinor felt her guilt
steadily grow.  And increasingly Billy manipulated, dominated, and
exploited her.

Hidden beneath his apparent sophistication lurked the little boy who
enjoyed pulling the wings from moths.  At in, Billy was still a bully
who found pleasure in dom ion

Sometimes in the street Billy asked Elinor if she had noticed some
young girl's fine eyes or long legs.  Aloud he wondered what it would
be like to caress her.  He enjoyed seeing Elinor's jealousy, which she
thought she hid so well, as he developed these erotic daydreams.

What he said he would Eke to do to the girl, Billy later did to Elinor,
whispering further erotic details as he touched her.  He told Elinor
that both men and women fantasized in this way.

"Stop being a stupid farm girl, and acquire a little more
sophistication in these matters," he ordered.

And Elinor acquiesced.  Against her will, she became fascinated by his
erotic fantasies, and eventually she willingly collaborated in this
sensual playacting.  Then she looked forward to it, as an alcoholic
looks forward to feeling his senses swim when his brain abdicates after
the first few drinks.

Billy continued to be openly flirtatious and did little to conceal his
occasional infidelities from Elinor; the worse he behaved, the more
submissive she became, for she was now so completely insecure that she
was terrified of losing him.  Whatever was wrong was her fault;
whatever was wrong she must make right.  Obsessed by Billy, she had
become addicted to his love.

Also obsessed by jealousy, Elinor wanted to know nothing of Billy's
amorous sorties, and yet perversely she longed to know every detail of
them.  She knew that Billy would obligingly provide these details, that
he would both torture her and satisfy her craving but he always made
her ask for them.  Always, in the end, she did.

It became a game a game that Billy obviously enjoyed.  He would ask her
what she thought had taken place between himself and the lady in
question.  He would have Elinor state her anxieties in specific detail,
occasionally interrupting her jealous visions by murmuring remarks such
as "You mean you suspect I did this to her."  And then he would touch
Elinor's body in the way she had described.

Eventually the game itself became a passion for Elinor, the passion an
obsession.  There lurked behind the game, however, the secret fear that
one day one of Billy's street girls, or one of the schoolgirls, or one
of the society beauties he met, would unexpectedly gain as slavish a
hold over him as he had over Elinor.

In fact, Billy's passing physical thirsts were quickly slaked and as
quickly forgotten, but he took care that Elinor should not realize
this.  Slowly she built up in her imagination the figure of her husband
as an irresistibly attractive, potent, and all-powerful man.

Billy would now rarely tell Elinor that he loved her.  He liked to keep
her in a permanent state of anxiety and jealousy, so that he could make
her do anything he wished.  Elinor longed for the words that she -now
seldom heard.  It was essential that Billy love her.  And of course, it
was essential that she love Billy, because this assuaged her feelings
of guilt about enjoying sex.

Elinor was also terrified of losing Billy because, like so many women
of her generation, she felt inadequate, unable to face life without a
man, no matter how badly he behaved.  She had no money of her own and
would be unlikely to get even domestic work, accompanied by a small
baby.  Like most other women, she was totally dependent upon her man,
and so never allowed herself the luxury of reacting with anger to his
bad behaviour.

But one morning, as Elinor did the dishes after breakfast, she suddenly
found herself shaking Billy's breakfast mug in a fury.  The previous
night, Billy had stumbled home, late and drunk.  While undressing, he
had knocked a photo frame to the floor and then accidentally stood upon
ap it; this had smashed the glass and torn the only picture of her
mother that Elinor possessed.

As, enraged, Elinor shook the mug, she suddenly realized, with cold
horror, that Billy could make her feel as anxious and muddled, as
miserable and worthless, as she used to feel after a strapping from her
father.

But Billy was not the inescapable tyrant of her childhood!  Billy was
Elinor's husband, chosen by her.  He was her beloved ... wasn't he?
Bewildered by the sudden violence of her emotion, Elinor made herself a
cup of tea and sat at the kitchen table.  For almost an hour, she
stayed there without moving as the cup of tea cooled before her.  For
once, she considered Billy's behaviour towards her without
rationalizing it.  She did not mentally suppress his cat-and-mouse
cruelty and remember only the charm he had shown during courtship.
Instead, she asked herself why both Billy and her father could make her
feel the same dragging unhappiness.

Suddenly Elinor could no longer refuse to admit that she had indeed
chained herself to another bully one who would darken the rest of her
life.  Her saviour had become her tormentor.  And with that realization
came tears that burned with pain.  Elinor put her head on the scrubbed
wooden table and sobbed until she was breathless and her eyes were so
swollen that she could hardly see.

Lifting her head, she pulled herself together.  Billy was her husband,
and Edward was her son, and this was her life.  She had no choice but
to go on.

She turned her face away from the reality that she couldn't bear to the
romantic vision of Billy with which she had fallen in love.  Last
night's drunken oaf was not the man she had married.  The real Billy
was the handsome, - 85 charming hero in the photograph at her bedside.
He was having a difficult time at the moment because he had been forced
to take a job that wasn't good enough for him.  "Of course he had
reason to be upset.  She would push all unpleasant thoughts out of her
mind and focus only on helping Billy.  Surely, in time, things would
get better, life would improve.  Of course it would.

CHAPTER 4

The next ten years were difficult for Elinor, as she saw less and less
of 'the real Billy', and her husband's drinking increased.

More and more, she found it necessary to justify and to compromise.
Bewildered, she found it hard to understand what was happening to her
life.  She wondered miserably whether she was doing all she might to
help Billy, because everything would be all right and their life would
be happy if only Billy didn't drink.

Sometimes Elinor also wondered whether, as Billy often said, his
drinking was in any way her fault.  If so, how had she disappointed
him, as he repeatedly accused her of doing?  And she wondered too why
she could never -stick to her ultimatums.  Why did she always believe
that Billy would change simply because he always promised to do so?  He
never did.

Elinor never knew when he would be home for meals, or whether he would
be home at all.  Eventually she learned not to count on Billy for
anything, neither his presence nor his absence.  If, thinking Billy
safely out of the way, she invited a friend from her polytechnic class
to her home, Billy invariably staggered in and insulted the friend.
Elinor, who didn't like to embarrass people, gradually stopped inviting
anyone -home, except Buzz, who was impervious to Billy's bad
behaviour..  On the few occasions when Billy not only was sober but did
not have a hangover, he was so defensive that Elinor was rarely able
to, discuss his drinking.

Edward, a pale, quiet child, kept out of his father's way as much as
possible.  He was a self-contained boy, who seemed able to communicate
-almost wordlessly with his mother, much to the irritation of his
father.  He had a gentle and sensitive nature, although he had
inherited his father's impressive, wide-shouldered physique and was
clearly going to be tall and strong.  He also had his father's untidy
strawlike hair and neat features, though after -Edward's nose was
broken in a football game Billy wouldn't allow the boy to have it
reset, because it made him look tougher: Billy was exasperated by his
son's lack of obvious manly qualities and his preference for nature
study to sports.

Some aspects of their life together remained normal.  Billy still saw
Joe Grant, who had married his boss's daughter early in 1929.  Elinor
still saw Buzz regularly.  Buzz never said, "I told you so."  But one
summer Sunday evening, after Billy had been particularly abusive to
Elinor in front of Buzz, the two women went to the cinema.  As they
reached the Kensington Odeon, Buzz quietly asked, "How much longer are
you going to put up with Billy's rotten behaviour?  For the rest of
your life?"  "Don't tell me I ought to leave him.  It'll spoil our
outing."

"But why.?  You've got the guts and the gumption we all saw that in the
war but where's your backbone gone?  I've never undersiood why you
don't just get up and leave Billy."

"It's not that simple."  Elinor shook her head.

"Don't say that!  Why don't you stop inventing obstacles?  Why don't
you decide that next time he's a bastard, you'll just walk out of that
front door!  Nell, you ain't got a hero to save you.  No woman has. You
got to save yourself I "I know you mean well," Elinor said as they
entered the Egyptian magnificence of the theatre foyer.  The fantastic
grchitecture reminded her of her childhood daydreams of Wng a
changeling, when she hoped that one day she would be swept off to
become an adored princess.  Now her forlorn hope was that one day her
fairy prince would turn back into a fairy prince, that one day Billy
would see how destructive his behaviour was; this pathetic hope enabled
her to five with him, as did her equally pathetic insistence on seeing
Billy through rose-coloured glasses..  As they entered the darkness of
the auditorium, Buzz added, "You used to have a mind of your own before
you married Billy, but now you can't seem to make any decision for
yourself."

"Do we have to discuss that aga in?"  "At least you used to know when
Billy treated you like a doormat.  Now when he treads on you you don't
even notice!  You almost apologized to him this afternoon when he'd
finished criticizing the meal."  .

"Be fair, Buzz.  Billy isn't violent; plenty of husbands are; but
Billy's never lifted a finger against me .. ."  "No, only his tongue:
he's beaten you black and blue with that."  Elinor said, "I know I'm
short on self-confidence, but Billy means well."  V don't think Billy
means well," Buzz said.

"I've watched him smash your self-confidence.  That's not a
well-meaning thing to do."

"Billy only criticizes me to be helpful.  He means to be kind."

"There ain't no such thing as being cruel.  to be kind!  People like
Billy are cruel to be cruel!  Don't mistake that for loving kindness."
Buzz fit a cigarette.

"I can't think why you don't leave him."

"Because he loves me he does really!"

Buzz snorted.

"A funny sort of love!  I can see that you love him you make endless
sacrifices for that rotter.  And like all doormats, you do it because
you secretly wish that's what he'd do for you!  Nell, I know you fell
in love with Billy.  I was there, remember?  He was a charmer a girl
would've had to be made of stone not to take a shine to him.  We all
watched him when he turned his charms on you, and we was all a little
jealous.  So I know, Nell.  I know why you fell for him, and I know
how.  What I don't know, and what I don't understand, is why you can't
see that the Billy O'Dare we met and fancied then is not the same man
you've got to go home to tonight."

"But Buzz, he loves me.  I know he does."  Buzz paused.

"Maybe he does, Nell, I can't speak for him," she said slowly.

"But I can say that his love ain't enough any more.  Not the way he
treats you.  And don't you deny it.  Yes, maybe in his own twisted way
he does love you, but again, Nell, it ain't enough!  What's gone, and
what you'll never get back, is the romance he used to win you over, and
that's what a woman needs.  It's an important part of a woman's life,
and men just don't understand it, or respect it, for that matter.  They
think it's silly.  But it ain't, and when it's gone, it leaves a void.
I know."  Buzz realized suddenly that she'd allowed her voice to rise
enough to attract the attention of others in the cinema.  Besides, they
were still standing in the darkened aisle, both a little startled by
the passion in Buzz's plea.  Self-consciously they sat in the nearest
empty seats.  Mellifluous, soothing music rose from the cinema organ, a
warning that the movie would soon be starting.  Struggling to lean
forward from the depths of the crimson plush seat, Buzz couldn't resist
raising one other important point.

"And just how long do you think you can stand Billy's boozing?"

"I can't stop him.  I can't do anything about it," Elinor said
miserably.

"But Billy's always sorry in the morning.  He always promises he'll
change.  I'm sure that one da go he'll really mean it."  Often a
repentant or badly frightened Billy had promised that he would stop
drinking.  The sad thing was that several times he had seriously tried
to stop.

"One day pigs'll fly," retorted Buzz, who knew that hope can be
destructive where, in reality, there is no hope.

"You know I couldn't leave him!  Where would I go?  And what would
Edward and I five on?"  "You could leave him," Buzz said quietly.

"You could get some sort of a job; you could be a waitress or a shop
assistant.  After all, Edward isn't a baby now he's nine years old, and
at school all day.  You could both sleep in our front parlour until you
got yourself sorted out.  Ma wouldn't mind."  Elinor shook her head.

"No, I could never leave Billy.  He needs me.  "She could not imagine
life without him.  "Look, this is my night out.  Please don't let's
talk about this any more."

It was still light when Elinor hurried home.  As she put her key in the
front door, she hesitated.  It sounded as if Billy had company.

In the living room, she found nine-year-old Edward, naked and with his
head hidden under a black top hat, sitting on a table.  He was gurgling
with laughter.  In his hand, he held a tumbler containing an inch of
green liquid.

His father was sprawled in the chintz armchair, a drink in his hand, a
bleary smile on his face.

Elinor dashed forward.  In one movement, she swept the hat from
Edward's head and grabbed his tumbler.  She sniffed it: creme de
menthe.

Edward gave his mother a slack, happy smile.  He swayed and nearly fell
from the table.

Elinor caught him.  Her son's body was cold.  She tried to control her
voice.

"Time for bed, Edward."

A silly smile spread over Billy's face.

"It's a father's job to teach a chap to drink," he said.

White-faced, Elinor snapped, "How dare you!"  She dressed the swaying
Edward, then went to the kitchen.  From her best teapot, she took the
two bank notes that she kept hidden for emergencies.  Without saying a
word, she took Edward and left the apartment.

On the following day, Buzz visited some friends, two doors down, who
were looking for a lodger.  For an extra ten shillings a week, they
were persuaded to take both mother and son.

On Monday, at midday, when Elinor knew that Billy would be at work, she
returned to Earls Court Square to pack.

As she entered the dark entrance hall, a woman looked out of the
ground-floor flat.

"I thought it was you, Mrs.  O'Dare," she said lugubriously.

"I knew someone would have told you about the accident.  The police
want to see you, dear."  Forty-five minutes later, Elinor was sitting
beside Billy's hospital bed.  His bandaged leg was raised in traction,
and one arm was in a plaster cast.  His head was also bandaged, and the
left side of his face was badly' grazed

"I ran after you."  Billy sounded sheepish.

"But the kerb seemed to move, and a lorry got me from behind, Bloody
stupid thing to do."

"Poor, poor Billy!"  Elinor said as she tenderly kissed him.

"Don't you worry about a thing, darling."  For only a fleeting moment,
she feared the wrath of Buzz.

But it was Edward who objected.  Still suffering from a hangover, he
looked at his mother and said in a voice of hopeless misery, "I didn't
think you'd make me go back.  Oh, why can't you leave him, Mummy?"  .

"Things are going to be different," Elinor promised, but as she saw
disbelief in Edward's face, she suddenly wondered how she could have
stubbornly held on to that belief for so long.  She remembered hoping
that things would change when her baby was born.  As long ago as that!
Then she hoped that things would change when the baby stopped crying,
then when the baby stopped teething.  She had always managed to find an
excuse for Billy's bad behaviour; she had always managed to produce an
apparently rational reason however tortured her rationalization for his
hurtful words and actions.

"Darling," Elinor said sadly, "what would Daddy do without me?  And
what would everyone say?"  "It won't matter what people say we won't be
there to hear them.  And what happens to Daddy will be his problem, not
ours."  Edward grasped her hands and pleaded.

"You know as well as I do that Daddy's a drunk and a bully and a
rotter.  Please let's not go back."

"Oh Edward, you don't understand," Elinor said miserably.

"You see, I love him."  Elinor could not explain because she did not
herself understand her love for Billy.  She simply knew in her heart
that Billy was her man, and she would love him to distraction and
destruction until death parted them.  Elinor longed for and believed in
hope and in love, with the firm confidence of one who never dared to
doubt it for a moment.

Edward said, "Mummy, you don't understand how different you are when
Daddy isn't around.  When you're with Daddy, you let him kick you
around.  I hate to see it."  Elinor remembered that Buzz had accused
her of being a doormat.  Sadly she said, "I can't help it, Edward. 
That's the way I was brought up.  We're going home now."

FRIDAY, 7 AUGUST 1936

Every month or so, Billy took his family to Larkwood, which continued
to crumble into decay.  His parents were

I

now quite frail and seemed to spend their time huddled like sparrows in
bad weather on either side of the drawing room fire.  Elinor
occasionally wondered why she had been frightened of them.

Elinor spent her visits to Larkwood either going for long vigorous
walks in the park or reading in the library'a dark room that smelled
sourly of old books and ghostly cigar smoke; it contained no books of
value but the complete works of many popular nineteenth-century
novelists, outdated atlases, musty reference books, and many boxes of
family papers.

One threatening afternoon in early August, when the sky was slate
purple and the air ominously still, Elinor opened a dusty box of old
household books: the earliest account book was dated 1712.  The weekly
household accounts had been analysed in thirteen columns, and so had
annual general expenditure.  The menu books written in careful
copperplate showed exactly what had been ordered from the cook on each
day.  The wages book recorded amounts paid long ago to staff, under the
headings "House', "Laundry, "Stables', "Kennels', "Gamekeepers', and
"Gardeners'.  The cellar book noted what wines had been bought and when
they were drunk.  Fascinated, Elinor started to read.

Later, she looked up as her mother-in-law entered the library.

"Look what I've found!"  Elinor held up a small chunky book bound in
green leather so dark it was almost black, except on the corners, which
had worn away.

"Oh, that's Rachel O'Dare's diary.  One of our family treasures.  She
lived in the reign of Queen Elizabeth.  There are some interesting
recipes in it you purchased one recipe at a time in those days, and
they were expensive.  I seem to remember that Rachel paid a guinea for
a dish of peas with bacon and chopped onion.  Of course, she also had
her own family recipe book: they were copied out by a clerk for each
daughter, upon her marriage."  Elinor leafed through the thin, brittle
pages.

"Here's a recipe for candied flowers!"

"We still use that for crystallizing violets, primroses, and rose
petals.  Rachel also had some pretty ideas for using flowers in
salads."  Elinor said, "I think I'd like to try some of these.  Could I
take the book to my room and copy some of the recip esT "By all means."
More than three hundred years after they happened, Elinor shared Lady
Rachel's adventures.  In the blue bedroom, as Elinor carefully turned
the pages, she learned about Rachel's life.  In her diary, Rachel had
recorded every detail of her country day, every domestic squabble and
reconciliation, every wager her husband lost, every gown he bought her,
every game she played with her children, every problem she had with her
servants, every time she felt depressed and was lo ste yn melencholy'.
Rachel noted in detail what happened at the local fairs, on the holy
days, on Christmas and other feast days.  Once, she was presented to
the Queen when Her Majesty paid a visit to a neighbour, the cost of
which nearly bankrupted him.

Before dressing for dinner, Elinor started to decipher the crabbed hand
and odd spelling of Rachel O'Dare's candied flower recipe.

"Thinking of starting a sweetshop, Elinor?"  Billy was looking over her
shoulder.

"No.  I'm copying a recipe from an old diary."  Billy's arm reached
around and slowly turned the pages of the worn green book.

Busy scribbling, Elinor murmured, "She has such a wry sense of humour.
I feel I know her.  In fact, that diary seems like reading a letter
from an old friend.  I know all Rachel's friends.  I know she didn't
like her father-in-law."

"He wasn't a very likeable man."  Billy yawned.

"He had -to get out of the west of Ireland pretty quickly, after
leaking information to the English.  He was a sort of collaborator a
fearful swine, by all accounts."  Again he peered over Elinor's
shoulder at the little diary.

"It's damned difficult to read, isn't it!  Spidery handwriting and
crazy spelling."

"You need patience."  Elinor slowly read: ""Today I walked the orchard
with Parson, and we did talk upon Joanna's wedding, which now grows
near.  As we did turn beneath green leaves, Parson did eye the fat,
black cherries, until I promise him a basket.  He spoke then of the
feasting here.  Again I see his eye right hungry, when I do prorraise
'twill be mighty.

"What manner of dish esT asks he.

"Five spits of roasting meat are set up in the kitchen," say I.

"We also shall feast on roasted swan, boiled fowls, and many little
birds.  Also much pike and salmon, with mighty, hot meat pies, and a
cold one with live larks to set the ladies skipping and shrieking.""
Billy said, "Don't stop."  He was listening carefully.

"I'm glad you like it too.  I'll go on with the greedy parson."  Elinor
read, absorbed: ""And sweetmeat sT asked Parson.

"Such as never have here been tasted," promised I, "following my
mother's receipt book for creams and syllabubs, jellies and puddings.
Also my own spiced fruit cake."

"And drink?"  asks Parson, so I poured for him from my mouth a stream
of claret wines from France, with sack, mead, cordials, and liquors,
such as is meet for this marriage feast.  Then doth he lick his lips,
whether at the sound of this banquet or thinking upon the swiving that
would follow, I know not.""

"What does "swiving" meanT Billy asked.

"Making love, I guess."

"Don't say "I guess"."

"Sorry, Billy," Elinor responded mechanically.  Although she didn't
attempt to alter her midwest em accent, she tried not to use American
expressions, because Billy didn't like her to and the British didn't
understand them.

"Better stop that and dress for dinner.  You know how testy Mother gets
if we aren't down before the gong stops ringing."

TUESDAY, I I AUGUST 1936

When they returned to Earls Court from Larkwood, Billy was in a bad
temper.  A visit to his family home always reminded him that his elder
brother would inherit the estate in its entirety.  Edward, now sixteen,
disappeared to the bedroom they rented for him on the floor above their
apartment.

Elinor opened the sitting-room window and leaned on the sill, looking
down on the square.  The soft summer breeze smelled of dust, roses,
warm grass, and horses" droppings.

Billy poured himself half a tumbler of whisky, sat down in the sagging
chintz armchair, and said wearily, "I suppose I'll have to tell you
sometime.  I've been fired."  His nonchalant air did not disguise his
pain.

Elinor turned from the window.

"Billy!  Why7 "First thing a journalist must remember when he's fired
is that the reason probably hasn't a bloody thing to do with his work.
The Globe's getting a new editor, and he wants to bring in his own
gang."  Billy added casually, "I don't think I'll look for another
newspaper job."  Elinor realized that he meant no other newspaper
wanted to hire him.

The following morning at seven o'clock, Elinor carried a cup of tea to
Billy.  Sitting on the edge of his bed, she said, "Why don't you see
what other sort of work is available?  Perhaps you could apply for this
job?"  She handed him the newspaper: she had ringed one entry in red
pencil.

Reacting slowly and reluctantly, Billy read, ""Needed at once, for
large manufacturing chemists, live-wire men qualified to call upon
doctors and chemists.  Splendid prospects for sound men."" He looked up
at Elinor.  ""Sound men".  That means no war veterans need apply."

"I know that your limp is painful, Billy, but a limp doesn't make
people feel uneasy like a missing arm or leg," Elinor said
persuasively.

"You needn't think I'm going to turn into a commercial traveller,"
Billy snarled.

"What are you going to turn into, Billy?"  Her clear green eyes
carefully studied him.  Although he took little exercise, Billy's body
was still tall, lean, and firm.  But today he had hangdog air and his
shoulders sagged familiar signs of hangover.  Elinor looked at the
leathery pouches under his eyes and his grey cheeks covered by silver
stubble.

She could not think why she loved him.  Billy gave her a sly smile.

"It so happens I have a better idea for making money., He threw back
the bedclothes and walked naked to the chest of drawers.  He pulled
open a top drawer, then turned to face her.  In his hand he held a
small -dark-green leather object.

"Why, that's Rachel O'Dare's diary!  Does your mother know you have iff
"No, she doesn't.  She'll never notice it's gone.  Don't worry, I'm not
going to sell it.  I've only borrowed it, and I'll return it."

"When are you going to return iff Elinor was shocked that he had so
casually removed something valuable.

"When you've written a book called Diary of an Elizabethan Housewife,"
Billy said triumphantly.

"I know just the right publisher for id" For a moment, Elinor wondered
if he was still drunk after his bout of the previous evening.  She
studied Billy's face: if he was drunk, his facial muscles slackened,
giving him a vacant look.  But that telltale sign wasn't there this
morning.

Quietly she said, "Billy, I'm not a professional writer.  I love
scribbling letters and I once won an essay prize in school, but I don't
know how to begin to write a book."

"You've got the beginning here."  Billy waved the little green diary at
her.

"Simply translate it into modern English.  Add explanatory paragraphs,
where necessary, to expand what Rachel is saying, or what's going on in
the rest of the sixteenth-century world print those bits in bold type
instead of footnotes: you don't want the thing to look scholarly."

"Where would I find out what was going on in the rest of the
sixteenth-century world?"  "What's the British Museum for?  Ask the
librarian to guide your research."

"But I don't know how to do research!"

"Ask Edward to show you."  Edward was studying history, hoping for a
scholarship to Oxford.  Billy added with airy truth, "Research just
means finding out things."  Elinor and Billy planned the book together;
he advised her to stick as closely as possible to the original text, as
that would be the easiest way to operate.  Billy drew up a list of work
deadlines for each item so that he would know immediately if Elinor was
falling behind schedule.  Edward showed his mother how to handle her
research in an orderly way: plywood orange boxes were piled against one
wall of the living room, and at Christmas Billy gave Elinor a
second-hand filing cabinet.

By the end of March 1937, Elinor had finished Diary of an Elizabethan
Housewife.  The book was to be published in November by Stansfield and
Hart.

Just before publication, Billy hurled himself into a flurry of
activity.  He wrote press releases; he.  persuaded every suede-shod
gossip writer he knew to mention the book, in return for various
favours.  Billy also carefully chose Elinor's outfit for the book
launch party, to be held at the Russell Hotel in Bloomsbury.

Elinor did not care for his choice.  Standing in a changing room at
Fortnum and Mason, she exclaimed, "What's gotten into you, Billy?  I
can't wear a bright pink moire cocktail frock at three o'clock in the
afternoon!  Your mother would say it was dead common.  And we can't
afford iff "Joe Grant's paying for it," Billy said, and turned to the
saleswoman.

"The hat will be very important for the photographs.  Let's try that
white silk turban with the pink ostrich feathers."

"What photographs?"  Elinor asked, bewildered.

Billy looked carefully at his wife; she was nearly thirty seven now.
Elinor's face was thinner, but her pink, white, and golden colouring
was still striking.

"Pity they won't be in colour," Billy said.

"I've booked a sitting after lunch with Angus McBean he's the best
theatrical photographer.  You're going to be launched like a leading
lady!"

And Billy saw to it that everything went according to his plan.  He
supervised the press coverage, the interviews on the wireless, and the
trips to book shops for autograph sessions, to which Elinor travelled,
at Billy's insistence, in a hired white Rolls-Royce paid for by
Elinor's astonished publishers, who had never before done anything to
attract publicity beyond sending review copies to a few literary
editors.

To the surprise of everyone except Billy, Diary of an Elizabethan
Housewife by Elinor Dove was an immediate success.  The illustrations
were copious and charming; the book was historically correct yet didn't
read like a dull history book, for Elinor had re-created Lady Rachel's
life so vividly that readers felt they could lean out and touch her. As
Billy kept telling the press, almost anyone would find the book an
acceptable Christmas gift, and many did.

Edward, who had won a senior exhibition and was now reading history at
Merton, was as delighted by his mother's success as he was by his new
freedom.  He loved Oxford all the more so as he had just acquired his
first girlfriend.  Her name was Jane, and she, too, was a first-year
history student.

SATURDAY, I JANUARY 1938

Elinor leaned back against her pillows and stretched luxuriously in the
weak warmth of the winter sun, marvelling at how her life had recently
improved.  This was the first time since she'd known him that Billy
hadn't had a hangover on New Year's Day!  He had started to cut back
his drinking after a painful illness, when his doctor warned that his
body wouldn't stand up to such punishment.  He hadn't minced words, and
Billy had been frightened by the verbal sketch of cirrhosis of the
liver.

Lying naked beside her, Billy yawned and stroked his moustache.

"I've got a present for you, darling.  A new contract for the next
book."

"Oh.  good.  The Elizabethan cookery book?"

"Not exactly," Billy said.

"They want a novel."  In the crimson and gilt splendour of the cafe
Royal, Billy had lunched with the publisher and his senior editor. They
both thought that Elinor had a natural talent for writing.  Her work
showed a rare observation, fresh directness, and an eye for the
unexpected.  Her characters were not two-dimensional stereotypes but
real people who leapt right off the page, prepared to talk or argue
with the reader.

Billy had sat back, immediately th inking: international best-seller
... first novel ... Margaret Mitchell ... Gone with the Wind ...
Hollywood ... movie rights.  He said, "I have to tell you that we have
already been approached by Billy Collins ..

The advance was agreed by the end of the meal.  Billy now saw a new
life stretching before him, and it was very like his old life before
the war.  It was clearly in his interest to develop Elinor's ability as
a novelist because if Elinor could earn good money, then Billy as her
manager would never need another job.

As he sketched Elinor's new career to her, she sat up in bed and
blinked.

"But, Billy, I've never written a novel!"  She was bewildered.

"I couldn't do it I wouldn't know how to star tV "I'll teach you.  It's
simple."  Elinor knew immediately that Billy was serious, and that it
would be useless to argue.  She realized that her day would be wasted
trying to change his mind.

"I'll get breakfast," she said, shifting to get out of bed.

"No," Billy said, restraining her, "I'll get breakfast."  Ten minutes
later, Elinor stared at a worn, flower-patterned tray upon which stood
a jug" of milk, an apple, several slices of buttered bread, and a red
exercise book.

Billy said, "That's all you're getting until you fill ten pages to my
satisfaction."

"But what shall I write about?  What do I know about?  Life on a farm?
The horror of a French hospital in the war?  Trying to survive after
it?  People don't want to read depressing stuff like that they know too
much about it!"

"Write what other people don't know about," Billy suggested.

"Then they can't check on you.  Write a historical novel.  Start with a
rape."

"But I've never ... I don't know what2 "Then I'll show you."  As Billy
hurled himself upon her, the milk jug crashed to the floor.

"Later, Billy murmured, "You have talent, but that is only the
beginning.  The first thing a writer has to learn is discipline.

To teach her this, Billy locked Elinor in the bedroom.  Her first
reactions to imprisonment were defiance and revolt, She did not touch
the red exercise book.

"What an ungrateful bitch you are!"  growled Billy at midday, when he
brought her bread and milk.

"If it wasn't for me, you wouldn't have had this success that's so
clearly gone to your head!"

Elinor, of course, knew that this was true, because Billy had said it
to her so many times.

After a day of boredom, with no one to talk to and nothing to read,
Elinor capitulated.  At teatime, she dipped her pen into the bottle of
Stephens" blue-black ink and started to write.

Billy made it clear that he was not satisfied with her efforts.

"You're not trying hard enough!"  he exclaimed with a frown as he read
what she had written.

"You'd think 'that Scott of the Antarctic wasn't trying hard enough!"
Elinor said, showing a flash of her old spirit.

He gave her a slim book on punctuation.

"Learn this by heart.  I'll test you on a chapter every evening, before
supper.  If you don't know it, you get no supper."  When Elinor flubbed
the third chapter, Billy locked her in the bedroom again, as if she
were still a schoolgirl who hadn't learned her lesson.  Then he left
the flat and stayed out all night.

He returned at eight o'clock the following morning, dishevelled and
tired.  He smiled at Elinor as he stood in the bedroom doorway.

"Can you now tell me the difference between a colon and a seinicolonT
In a frenzy of jealousy, anxiety, and fear, Elinor quickly recited the
carefully memorized lesson, moving all the while across the floor
towards Billy.

I Her heart pounded when he bent to kiss her; she lifted her face
towards his, as a prisoner towards the light.  She felt his hand grasp
her breast with rough passion; then, without a word, he swept her into
his arms and carried her to their bed.

She felt the erotic, harsh scraping of his moustache against her soft
hair, and the light scratch of the stubble on his unshaven face.  Her
anxiety was replaced by the tension of passion.

Eventually Elinor produced a story synopsis that Billy found
satisfactory.  Together, they visited the London Library and left with
fifteen research books.

Elinor felt a little more cheerful.

"I suppose I must remember that everyone has at least one book in
them," she said.

"That's a he, as any publisher will tell you," Billy grunted.

"Some people haven't got so much as a paragraph of a pamphlet in them."
Billy proved to be an unsympathetic, tough, but ultimately excellent
critic, who repeatedly urged Elinor to concentrate on plot, pace, and
action" scenes.

"Cut scenic descriptions to a maximum of two lines."  he told her.

"If your readers wanted to read about birds, trees, and sunsets, they'd
buy a nature book."  Elinor wept when she didn't understand what Billy
wanted her to write, or felt that she couldn't do it.

"Why?  Why do I have to rewrite it aga in?"  she complained one
evening.

"I can't see what's wrong with what I've written!"

Then listen to me more carefully," Billy said in a soft voice that
raised the hairs on Elinor's spine.

"As you write, you must think yourself into each of your characters. Be
an actress!  I want to know what Lydia feels when her sister's husband
kisses her!"

"But I've told you "Don't tell me what's happened show me what's happen
Billy roared.  This dull rubbish it!  ing!  I want to experience sounds
like a newspaper report.  Get some life in it!  Remem her that you are
the eyes, the ears, the nose, and the heart of your reader. Always
remember that.  I want to feel that I'm there, hidden in the cold
shadow behind the hedge, as Cynthia watches her husband kiss Lydia.  I
want to see them embrace in the garden, and I want to shiver in the
moonlight as I bite my lip to stop myself from crying or cursing at
them!"

Elinor stared at Billy with surprise.  He had just sketched what it
felt like to experience jealousy.  He must therefore understand the
pain that he had made her suffer.

The following evening, she cried tearfully, "Yesterday you told me that
I need more emotion in my work, that I must feel the passion that my
characters feel and today you hand me this dusty little book on
grammar.  How can I feel passion when I have to think about gram marT
"Try," Billy advised grimly, "and never forget that I know what's best
for you."  Often, in despair, she Rung herself upon the bed and wept,
but tear s did no good.  Paradoxically, the only thing that made her
forget her helplessness, her bewilderment, her anxiety, her
indignation, and her despair was scribbling in the red exercise
books.

Every morning, Elinor hurriedly threw on a bathrobe and ate the meagre
breakfast Billy fixed for her.  He then locked her in the bedroom, and
did not unlock the door until she -banged on it at midday and then
pushed ten pages of scribbled manuscript under it.  If her pages were
good enough, Billy carried a tray of fruit and coffee to the little
desk at the bedroom window, where Elinor worked.  If the pages were not
good enough, he simply tore them up and threw the pieces out of the
window, to flutter slowly down Ear Court Square.

When Elinor finished her frugal luncheon Billy feared a large meal
might make her sleepy, she hurriedly washed and dressed while mentally
preparing the next ten pages.  After a further ten pages a total of
five thousand words a day, she was released from the bedroom to prepare
the evening meal.

While Elinor cooked supper, Billy scribbled his transitional
suggestions in the margins of her work; he corrected her grammar, her
punctuation, and her abysmal spelling.  After supper, Elinor rewrote
her work; Billy stood over her, urging her to cut this or emphasize
that.

When her writing was finished to Billy's satisfaction, he would pick up
Elinor in his arms and carry her to bed.

There he would caress her exhausted body until it wearily responded to
his touch, with increasing willingness, and finally with a passionate
abandon she had not thought possible, spent as she was from writing.
After a few weeks, Elinor no longer resented the sound of the key
turning in the lock of the bedroom door after breakfast.  Instead, she
trembled with carefully concealed excitement as she waited for the
little click of the lock, which now transported her into the mysterious
and limitless world of her imagination.

By the end of the day, Elinor was not only exhausted but anxious; she
worried whether her work was good enough.  Only Billy could lull this
anxiety; only Billy could reassure her that her work reached his high
standards; only Billy could then cares singly transport her to a world
of passion in which description and narrative thread were forgotten.

In Billy's arms, Elinor felt successful, sensuous, desired, protected,
happy and safe.  She did not see herself as a bird imprisoned in a
cage, for no cage was needed.  Elinor was bound to Billy by the
invisible, secret, silken cords of a voluptuousness of which she was
ashamed but to which io6 was addicted.  She was both captivated and
motivated" by Billy, who, having made her totally dependent upon him
both mentally and physically, kept her firmly under his thumb.

Elinor was bullied, cheated, rejected, and treated with amused and open
contempt, but she was Billy's victim, his invisibly shackled slave: she
was helplessly, hopelessly enthralled.  by him.  Billy's mesmeric gaze
could still make Elinor feel worthy or unworthy, anxious or confident.
And, sometimes he permitted her to be happy.

One of these occasions was in June 1938, when Elinor's work was
interrupted by the marriage of their son, Edward, to Jane, the girl he
had fallen in love with at Oxford.  The ceremony took place in St.
Bartholomew's, a small Norman church north of Oxford that had not been
much altered in the past nine hundred years.  Elinor helped with the
decorations and, in the process, got to know more of her
daughter-in-law, a young woman she found both intelligent and
endearing.  Elinor liked Jane's quiet tenacity and her earnest but
forceful speech.  In truth, she wished that Edward had not insisted on
rushing into marriage, but if he must and he had hinted that it was
necessary, then he could not have chosen a mote appropriate bride.

Eventually, after much effort, anxiety, and pain, Elinor produced a
well-constructed novel with well-developed scenes and believable
characters; she finished it in early January Of 1939, two days before
Jane produced her and Billy's first grandchild.

As she sat by Jane's hospital bedside and held baby Clare in her arms,
Elinor was astonished to find herself a i.grandmother, for, at the age
of thirty-nine, she still felt seventeen inside..  Again she examined
the tiny, perfect toes as they curled sAd uncurled.  She lightly
stroked the miniature, Nefer titi like head, marvelling at the
still-visible skull joins beneath the dark fuzz.  With joy, she gazed
into the old, wise eyes of this poised newborn baby.

"She has Edward's eyes," Jane said proudly.

"Apart from that, she's the image of you."  Jane was small and thin,
pale and dark.

Although they were so young, Jane seemed perfect for Edward.  They
lived in a big house in north Oxford with Jane's father, a widowed
history professor, who didn't seem to notice.  He didn't care what
happened, provided nothing upset his routine.

To Billy's disappointment, Elinor's Elizabethan romance, Rebellious
Princess, did not achieve the same level of success as the diary.  No
messenger appeared from Paramount or MGM, and although Billy personally
delivered a copy of the book to Vivien Leigh's London home he never
received an acknowledgement.

The publishers were more pragmatic.

"You can hardly expect her to pull off a winner with her first
non-fiction book and her first novel," Mr.  Stansfield said, over
oysters at Wheeler's.

"The book is selling well for a first novel, and we're pleased with her
progress."  Stansfield and Hart had purchased an option on Elinor's
next five novels.

"I'm only sorry that your wife couldn't spare the time to have lunch,
for I could then reassure her in person."

"She hates to break up the day finds it stops her moment urn Billy
murmured, having neglected to tell Elinor of the invitation.

"She's already started on the next novel kept to the same period, as
you suggested, which cuts down her research.  She's settling down in
that period nicely.  Shouldn't be surprised if she started to wear
padded sleeves and a farthingale."  Billy now spent his mornings
reading the newspapers, and behaved as if Mr.  Chamberlain relied on
his advice which was to kick those German bastards out of Austria and
back into their own country, before the British found themselves in
another war. But Mr.  Chamberlain didn't listen, and by September, when
baby Clare was nine months old, Britain and France declared war on
Germany.

Jane was again pregnant.

"Just as well her mother left her a bit of money," Billy said sourly.
Elinor said nothing, although she secretly agreed with him.  Edward had
done the right thing when Jane first became pregnant, but they should
both have been more responsible and taken precautions after Clare's
birth: two children were too much of a load for two kids of nineteen
especially now, when Britain was at war.

"Appeasement," Billy said, on the morning before Christmas.

"We should have been tougher with the bastards earlier.  We were too
aggressive the first time, and not aggressive enough this time.  We
should have rubbed their Nazi noses in it, like puppies, when they made
their first little mess and marched into Austria."  That evening, Billy
returned home late, only mildly drunk and very happy because of his new
job; he was to work in an administrative capacity at the War Office,
liaising with the RAF.

As he was telling Elinor about it, the telephone on the hall table
rang.  Billy picked it up, listened, and said in his new, clipped
voice, "Well done, m'boy.  I expect you'll want to tell your mother ...
Edward and Jeremy, that friend of his, have joined up.  They've been
drafted into the intelligence service."  On the afternoon of Monday, i
i March 1940, Edward telephoned his mother to tell her that Jane's
second baby, Annabel, had just been born, two weeks early.

Elinor was unable to reach Billy, as he was not in his log office, so
she had to contain her excitement until that evening, when they had
planned a rare night out to see Greta Garbo and Melvyn Douglas in
Ninotchka.

Outside Billy's favourite pub, the Star and Garter at the top of
Whitehall, people slowly groped their way through the blackout.  As
Elinor walked into the bar, a blast of fight and noise greeted her.  A
piano pounding "Roll Out the Barrel" was surrounded by a singing,
khaki-clad crowd, their fists wrapped around tankards of beer.
Elsewhere a group of sailors gathered round an accordionist were
bawling, "All the nice girls love a sailor."  The place smelled of
stale cigarettes, stale hops, and stale sweat, but nobody cared, and
the atmosphere was one of cheerful euphoria.  Elinor struggled through
the crowd to a small corner table where she had spotted a couple of
unoccupied seats.

When Billy appeared in the doorway, she stood up and waved until he saw
her, then cradled an imaginary baby and gave him the thumbs-up sign.

"Boy?"  he mouthed questioningly.

Elinor shook her head.  Billy shrugged, smiled, then fought his way to
the counter to buy drinks.

As he carried them from the bar, Elinor saw a young girl, hatless and
slim as a bulrush in a dark brown coat, dash forward and tug at Billy's
sleeve; her face was anxious as she spoke to him.

Billy looked exasperated as the girl clung to his sleeve.  With a
sudden movement, she laid her head against his shoulder.

Billy angrily jerked his head towards Elinor.  The girl looked her way
and Elinor saw a freckled, oval face with short brown hair and large,
tearful dark eyes.

Billy yanked his sleeve free, then continued to batt1c through the
crowd towards Elinor.

"Who was th at?"  Elinor asked him when he reached her.  "Oh, just a
girl from the newspaper office.  One of the secretaries!  "What's her
nam eT "I forget, actually."

"If you don't tell me, I'm going to ask her."

"For Christ's sake, Elinor, can't we just once have a night out without
your jealous imagination taking off like a Spitfire?  I think she's
called Pat Kettle!  "Why is she crying?  And why did she ask you to
help her?"  That had been obvious.

"Some trouble at the office.  Some documents are missing.  She's under
suspicion.  I can't do anything about it, as I told her."

"She's in love with you I can see it."  Standing by the bar, the girl
still gazed sadly at Billy; she wore an expression that Elinor knew
well, the expression of a puppy that has just been kicked by its
master.

"I can't help that," Billy said tersely.

"Drink up, or we'll be late."

"For heaven's sake, Billy, she's only a child," Elinor said angrily.

"Couldn you have left her alon eT She watched as Miss Kettle turned
despondently away, towards the door, and disappeared in the crowd.

"Be reasonable, old girl.  Can I help it if some woman takes a shine to
meT "Yes, you can help it," Elinor replied bitterly.  She put her
untouched drink on the table.

"We've been married for twenty-two years and you're nearly fifty, for
heaven's sake.  How old is she?  Nineteen?  A young girl doesn't fall
for a man of your age unless she's pursued and courted.  I can just
about remember your romantic approach, Billy.  It was very effective!
Billy laughed this off.

"No, darling you were always the romantic.  Now tell me about my new
granddaughter.  And drink up.  We're already late for the cinema."

III

CHAPTER 5

SATURDAY, 8 MARCH 194 1

Almost three years after they were married, Edward and Jane were
celebrating Jane's birthday at the C06 de Paris in London, when two
fifty-kilo German bombs fell down an air shaft in the nightclub,
straight on to the dance floor.  Edward and Jane were killed instantly,
their bodies charred almost beyond recognition.  Billy, silent and
regretful, was kinder to Elinor than he had been since their marriage.
Elinor, in a state of shock from which she felt she would never
recover, took charge of the orphaned children and had to adapt quickly
to the demands of a young family.

A few months after this tragedy, at closing time at the Star and
Garter, Billy fell in the blackout, with a resultant compound fracture
of his left fibula, which was slow to heal.  He now found it difficult
to walk and was unable to continue with his job.  Eventually he joined
Elinor in the country with the three little girls; everybody said how
sad is was that Miranda had been born only a month before Jane and
Edward were killed.  The near-derelict cottage was on the Larkwood
estate; there was no space at the big house, which now served as an
officers" convalescent home.

Their new circumstances required new literary discipline.  Billy now
made Elinor get up in the dark, at five a.m."  to write until nine
a.m."  seven days a week.  But those few hours a day belonged only to
Elinor, and during that time she forgot the cold, discomfort, and
deprivation of war; she even forgot the loss of Edward, which otherwise
was constantly present in her waking time, sapping the strength and
hope from her body.  As her pen detailed the rich clothes, splendid
jewellery, and sybaritic banquets of delicious food with delicate wine,
Elinor escaped back to the leisurely, bountiful, lyrical life of
Elizabethan England.

The rest of her day was spent looking after the three baby girls,
struggling to shop and cook for all of them, and coping with life
without electricity, running water, or inside sanitation: there was a
wooden shed at the end of the garden, and water was pumped from a well
in the courtyard.  Elinor ignored this lack of comfort.  She was
determined to see only the romantic charm of the cottage, which stood
on the southern slope of a wooded hill, with a view of undulating
fields beyond the small garden where Billy raised neat rows of
vegetables.  Elinor enjoyed the peace of the country, especially in
winter on cold, clear, snowy days, and in summer when the wind rippled
through the field of ripe wheat; then, she was always reminded
ofherchildhood, although British wheat fields were tiny compared to
those of Minnesota.

And Elinor quickly became a doting grandmother.  Everybody said what
pretty little girls they were: all three had Billy's mesmeric
aquamarine eyes, solemn and staring.  Clare, the eldest, was dark and
frail, a quiet child as her father had been.  Annabel looked like
Elinor as a child; she was a rosy-cheeked, chubby little thing, with
thick fair hair and an unusually pretty face.  Miranda, the youngest,
had a pale, freckled face; she was skinny and small for her age.

"Yes, we're very lucky," Elinor would smile when anybody complimented
her on the three sisters.  But no number of adorable grandchildren
could replace Edward.  Like most mothers, she had thought of her own
child as still flesh of her flesh and blood of her blood, still a part
of her own body, joined by an invisible umbilical cord that could never
be cut; and so now she felt bereft, as if a part of her had been
amputated.

Every time Elinor saw aquamarine eyes staring up at her, in her mind's
eye again she saw Edward as a child and felt poignant, wistful regret.
She wished that she had not been so careless of those ordinary hours
when he had been in the room while she ironed, or darned, or listened
to the radio.  Every time she remembered her beloved only son, Elinor's
heart seemed to shrivel and she felt a physical pain in her breast.
Rather than give in and break down in tears before the frightened
little girls, she would make an effort of will and turn her mind to her
plot problems with her book, a diversion that was always successful.

SUNDAY, 5 AUGUST 1945

Nearly two years after starting it, Elinor finished her fourth novel.
She had enjoyed almost every moment of it; she had even persuaded
herself that getting up in the dark was exciting, although the past
winter had been so cold that she wore her coat at her desk, draped
blankets around her legs, and propped her feet on a hot-water bottle.

Elinor worked all day on the novel.  Billy, knowing that the rhythm and
crescendo of the ending should be uninterrupted, saw that she was
undisturbed.  He brought fresh cups of tea and soup to her desk and
took away the cold, untouched ones as she scribbled, oblivious to his
presence.

Just after eleven o'clock that night, Elinor put down her pen, removed
her spectacles, rubbed her eyes, stretched, and, like any novelist,
started to have doubts.

Perhaps it should not be called Deadly Fortune but Fatal Fortune.
Elinor didn't want it to sound like a detective story, although that
was exactly what the novel was a series of murders in one Elizabethan
family, in order to gain control of an estate.

Elinor stretched again.  She felt as if she needed a walk.  She felt as
if she wanted a drink.  She felt hungry.  She felt wide awake.  She
felt light-headed.

A bottle of cider stood on the kitchen dresser, a lamb chop lay in the
metal-mesh meat safe that hung outside the kitchen door; she cooked the
chop and drank the cider.  For the moment, she felt completely alone in
the world, and comfortable.  She picked up the Daily Telegraph from the
kitchen table, folded it at the crossword, then decided not to do it,
because she could never finish the thing and it made her feel
inadequate.  She looked at the headlines once again: nothing much was
happening.

Far away on the other side of the world, where it was early morning, a
small parachute was floating down from a B bomber.  At eight-fifteen
a.m."  a nuclear chain reaction in the bomb built up a temperature of
several million degrees centigrade, which created a fireball that
seemed brighter than the sun.  This fireball expanded to measure two
hundred and fifty yards in diameter.  One second after it had been
detonated over Hiroshima, the world's first atomic bomb signalled the
end of the war.

TUESDAY, 9 JULY 1946

Joe Grant's office in Carey Street, immediately behind the assizes
court, was almost a replica of his study in the country."  with its
dark green leather appointments.  Joe looked older than fifty-one,
Elinor thought as she sat in a wing chair by the side of the empty
fireplace.  She suspected that he carefully cultivated his Pickwickian
traditional-lawyer look.

Joe smiled and said, "You haven't changed at all, Elinor.  A touch
older, as we all are, but you haven't changed."  He basked in her wide,
delighted smile.

"What flattery," said Elinor, now forty-six.

"How's your family, Joe?"  "Ethel has a touch of arthritis, but the
boys are fine.  Michael has finally settled down at Eton it helps if
your elder brother is already there."

Elinor briefly reflected that, while Joe's children had benefited from
their mother's money, she was glad Edward had not been brought up as
strictly as Adam and Michael Grant.  Their mother five years older than
Joe had been forty years old in 1930, when Adam was born.  After the
difficult birth, she had suffered badly from what was not then
recognized as postpartum depression, and seemed never to have forgiven
Adam for her misery; Ethel was more lenient with Michael, who was born
two years later, although she had not welcomed either pregnancy. Elinor
had never seen Ethel Grant kiss her children; even at bedtime she
merely offered a cool cheek to be kissed by them.  They had been
restricted to the nursery by a severe and strict nanny and had been
expected to behave as little adults rather than as children.  At least
in Edward's too short LIFE he had known the warmth of a mother's
love.

Joe looked over his neat desk.

"Why did you want to see me, Elinor?"  Billy made all her business
arrangements and had signed all the contracts prepared by Joe for the
thirty seven publishers around the world who had purchased Deadly
Fortune.

When Paramount Pictures bought the fibn rights to Deadly Fortune, which
had been an instant best-seller, and Vivien Leigh agreed to star in it,
Billy had bought a vintage Lagonda, and Elinor had once again made a
secret visit to an empty house about twenty miles distant from the
cottage, a dilapidated estate called Starlings.  The house was too big
to run comfortably in wartime but not big enough to be useful to the
forces, so shortly after war was declared, the entire estate had been
turned into carrot fields; after the war, when the boisterous land
girls and Italian prisoners of war who raised the carrots happily
abandoned them, the land was left neglected.  Now the place had fallen
into disrepair, its earth knee high in coarse grass.

In Joe's dark office, Elinor outlined her plan with barely rj6
contained excitement.  She wanted to surprise Billy by buying him his
own country place!  "It's not as grand as Larkwood, but it's just as
pretty!"  Elinor said.

"It's outside a little village called Maiden Bradley, near Warminster.
I'd like you to hand lethe purchase, Joe."  The folder she gave him
included snapshots of a decrepit but beautiful small stone Elizabethan
manor house, with a cherry orchard to one side of it.

"Don't you think, Joe, that if Billy lived in the way he was brought
up, he would ... settle down, and relax, and be happy?"  Poor Elinor
was still hoping that she could tame the old rascal, Joe thought. 
Aloud he said, "It's beautiful, Elinor, but ... how can you afford this
house?" "It's a bargain five thousand pounds!"  Elinor exclaimed.

"Paramount paid forty thousand dollars for Deadly Fortune.  There must
be enough money somewhere, even after tax."  Joe said uncomfortably,
"All the money was paid to Billy, as your manager."  There was a note
of sorrow in his voice.

Elinor looked sharply at him.  Slowly she said, "You mean ... he's
spent it all?"  Joe hesitated.

"I believe that Billy may have made some unwise investments on the
stock exchange."  He realized that Elinor, who could rationalize and
excuse her husband's drunken bullying and lechery, was now faced with
undodgeable evidence that Billy was a liar, a cheat, and some might say
a thief.  Joe added, "To be fair, Elinor, Billy insisted on repaying
every penny I've ever lent him."  Elinor's eyes filled with tears.
Nothing in her hand, for all that work.

Up to now Elinor had willingly believed Billy's plausible explanations
of his lying, cheating, and other petty dishonesty: he had done it to
help someone out; he hadn't realized what he was getting into; he had
been lied to; he had been let down.  But nothing could explain away
this betrayal.

"I might be able to raise a loan for you," Joe said, "or a further
book option of course, I couldn't go directly to your publisher behind
Billy's back .. ."  Which meant that he would, Elinor reckoned.

"I'm confident," he went on, "that Stansfield and Hart would be open to
some agreement so that you could purchase this house.  After all, you
will probably be happier and write better in more congenial
surroundings."  Fighting back tears, Elinor said, "Please speak to Mr.
Stansfield as soon as possible."  She looked hard at Joe, who knew that
she was also saying, I'm trusting you to do this in some way that won't
humiliate Billy, because otherwise my life will be intolerable, and I
shall have to live with the real Billy instead of my romantic view of
him, which is the only thing that makes the reality bearable for me.

Mentally replacing her rose-coloured spectacles, Elinor said firmly,
"Without Billy to make me work, and to sell my work, I would have
achieved nothing.  So I suppose it is really his money ... Because
truly I owe my career to Billy."  She had once argued that the talent
was hers, but Billy had quickly pointed out that -the talent had been
trained and disciplined by him, and so her success was due to him.
Billy repeatedly told her, "You owe everything to me.  Without me, you
would be nothing!  Without me, you would never be able to write.  And
without me, you would certainly never be published.  I am the one who
persuaded publishers to risk their money on your work."  Elinor had to
admit there was some truth in what he said.  Before Billy's schooling,
she had known nothing of the craft of writing, and she had had no idea
how to discipline herself.

Joe looked at Elinor.  There were things he would have liked to say to
her, but it wouldn't be correct to do so.  Besides, Billy was
indisputably the man in Elinor's life, and Joe did not intend to
interfere in their marriage.

riAOM11NDAY 13 JULY 1947 I'VND 06 year later, after her brisk midday
walk, Elinor strolled up the winding drive of her new home, between
rhododendron bushes that formed great banks of shiny, dark leaves
splashed with mauve and white blossoms.  This floral guard of honour
meandered half a mile, from the house to the hedged boundaries of
nineteen acres of garden and parkland.

After she rounded the final bend and could see Starlings in front of
her, Elinor paused to admire it once again.  The long, low, beautifully
proportioned Elizabethan house, with its front of mellow brick, stone
mullions, and tall chimneys, now looked as well-kept as it probably had
been four hundred years earlier.

Briefly Elinor remembered their Earls Court home: the entire apartment
would have fitted into the oak-panelled entrance hall of Starlings.
Edward had been raised in that cramped flat in sooty London, but his
daughters were now able to enjoy a gracious life in the country, thanks
to their gran's busy brain and ever-scribbling right hand.

As she inhaled the honey-tinged air, Elinor wished that her mother
could know about her success, could see her lovely house, as romantic
as if it had sprung up from a child's book.  How strange it was, she
thought, that her mother's idea of bettering herself had been to get
away from the grinding, incessant toil of life on the land.  But now
that Elinor could do as she pleased after midday what she most loved
was to work in the soil.  Gardening gave her great satisfaction; it
also gave her time to think of new plots for books, to dream up new
schemes, imagine new characters.

Sometimes, of course, her mind wandered to real matters, some of them
quite disturbing.  One memory she couldn't seem to escape was the day
they had moved into Starlings, when she had accidentally uncovered a
batch of battered photographs in Billy's den.  They were black-and
white studio pictures of what looked like a ten-year-old girl, shot
from the waist downward.  Her slim, coltish legs were sprawled across a
bed; Elinor recognized the dragon patterned blue bedspread that she had
scrapped when they left Earls Court.  The child wore short white socks
and black, Shirley Temple, ankle-strap shoes, and that was all.  In
some pictures, she lay on her back; in some, she was on her stomach,
one leg languidly kicking back, bent at the knee.

When, with shaking hands, Elinor showed these pictures to Billy, he
shrugged his shoulders and agreed that the photographs were obscene. He
said he thought he had destroyed them: they had been taken years ago by
a photographer who had been bombed out of his studio, when Billy had
put him up for a few days.  Elinor had been in the country, preparing
the cottage for their occupation.

Elinor wanted to believe him.  With stubborn determination, she focused
on the many pleasant things in her life and shut her eyes to Billy's
increasingly unpleasant behaviour which was, Elinor told herself, only
due to the fact that once again he was drinking far more than was good
for him.

Billy's three granddaughters, now six, seven, and eight years old, were
embarrassed and bewildered when "Daddy Billy smelt funny', which
invariably meant he would 'act funny" as well, frequently teasing them
in a rough way, sometimes even searing them.

Annabel and Miranda ran off and hid whenever they heard the front door
slam followed by Billy's heavy, uncertain tread upon the stairs.  But
Clare reacted differently.  Perhaps it was because he was irritated by
Clare's anxiously self-righteous air the air or an elder sister who
felt she was supposed to look after the little ones that Billy picked
on Clare more than on the other two.

But of course, Billy treated Clare with cruelty only when there was
nobody around to see him do it: when Elinor was visiting her publisher
in London, or when it was the nanny's day off.  Clare, whose instinct
was to smooth, not ruffle, troubled waters, never mentioned her
grandfather's harsh treatment, and indeed she would have found it
difficult to describe what she was complaining about.  Few children
feel that they have the power to complain about an adult; and every
child in Clare's class at school talked of being slapped occasionally,
or beaten if the crime was serious.

As a result of his mistreatment of her, Clare avoided Billy whenever
possible.  When she returned from school, she always asked, "Is Daddy
Billy at ho meT And if the answer was yes, no matter how cold the
weather, Clare would immediately ask if she could play in the garden or
go for a walk in the woods.

Poor Clare.  As the eldest, she was the only sister with vague memories
of her dead parents, and she had a forlorn air, as if she were a lost
child, forgotten on some railway station platform.  She survived
Billy's cruel attacks in the only ways that a vulnerable young child
could: by mentally withdrawing from any painful scene and by hopefully
using magical means.  Hidden behind the rhododendron bushes, she would
mix potions of berries and grass and day-dream, as she willed Daddy
Billy to die.

Other minor superstitions also helped Clare: if she could count up to
seventy-five while holding her breath; if she put her knickers on in
the morning, left foot first; if there was an even number of letters in
the advertisement on the side of the school bus then he wouldn't be at
home when she returned from school.  Sometimes these spells worked.

As Clare grew more apprehensive and frightened reported as 'highly
strung" by her school, Elinor saw that, like her father, she was
developing into a quiet, nervous child.  Elinor hied to blank out
these comparisons because they conjured up guilt when she recalled
unpleasant memories of Edward's childhood: his father's bewildering
behaviour and humiliating, drunken cruelty had wrecked Edward's
self-confidence until he grew bigger and stronger than his father;
then, when Edward was at home, Billy curbed his bullying.

Instead, Elinor reminded herself how wdll Billy treated Annabel.
Golden-haired and pretty, she was Billy's favourite grandchild; she
would jump on his knee, put her little arms around him, and lean her
silken head against his shirt.  Billy was flattered by her flirtatious
manipulation and responded with generosity.  When Annabel had made
Billy smile, she would quickly ask him for what she wanted.

Shrewd little Annabel.  Billy couldn't be bothered to torment
Miranda.

"Dull little thing," he said.

"Nothing to say for herself.  No fun."  Clever little Miranda.
Unfortunately, Billy's increasingly bad behaviour no longer caused only
local scandal.  He had given several regrettable interviews to London
newspapers; Elinor's publisher had pointed out to her the folly of such
actions.  Her public wished to think of her as a romantic creature
draped upon a chaise-longue in a n6glig, who wrote with quill pen on
crackling parchment to a background accompaniment of gentle Scarlatti.
They should not hear that Elinor was a half-witted puppet who could not
have written her books without her husband's Svengali-like direction
and inspiration.  There had also been strong rumours also,
unfortunately, started by Billy that he had actually written Elinor's
books.

"But surely nobody believes th at?"  Elinor had protested.

"You have all my manuscripts, written in longhand, in my handwriting."
"Plenty of hacks will print a malicious story, without bothering to
check that it's true,9 Mr.  Stansfield had said.

"Malicious gossip sells newspapers, which makes money for newspaper
proprietors."

"Why tell me?  Why don't you talk to Billy?"  the wretched Elinor
asked.

"I have talked to your husband, but unfortunately it hasn't stopped
him.  I hope you can make him see how damaging such publicity is for
all of us."

As Elinor stared now at her beautiful house, she couldn't help
recalling that depressing luncheon with her publisher.  She felt vexed
with herself.  Why did such unpleasant thoughts not stay hidden at the
back of her mind?  Particularly today, when she should be looking
forward to her hour of triumph in her new home.  She should be checking
that the Georgian-mahogany table had been properly laid and the wine
decanted, and that the food preparation was proceeding smoothly for her
luncheon party.  Because, for the first time, Elinor was about to meet
her sister-in-law as an equal.

Behind her, a horn hooted.  She turned to see Madorie waving from a
battered prewar Armstrong-Siddeley.  Drat!  They had arrived early.
Elinor steeled herself to assume her normal air of optimistic happiness
as she prepared to show her romantic home to her sister-in-law.

Madorie's admiration for Starlings somehow left Elinor feeling
depressed.

"Such a lovely old house have you had it checked for woodworm?" 
Madorie trilled as she ate her rabbit pie.

"And subsidence?  The Crawleys lived in a house very similar to this.
Had to be pulled down before it fell on them ... Delicious carrots,
although I find a knob of butter helps the flavour ... What an original
idea to spread a lace tablecloth on a luncheon table..  ."

After their guests had departed, Billy returned to the dining room to
help himself to another glass of port.

"You'll

neW get it, right, old girl," he grinned at Elinor.

"Maorie -win never let you forget that, to her, you're a jumped-up farm
labourer, and whatever you do she's never going to change her view.  I
can't understand why you bother with the old bitch, but then whatever
you hold against me, no one can say I'm a snob."

"No, you're not a snob," Elinor said, trembling with fury, "but you do
love using me to tease your family.  You were teasing them when you
first took me to Larkwood.  You were showing your brother, who was
going to inherit all the family wealth and power, that you had it in
your power to humble your family by introducing me into it."  She
paused as an idea struck her.

"No, it's not teasing what you really enjoy, Billy, is tormenting
people!  I bet that when you were little, you pulled wings off
butterflies, and legs off wasps, and ... and..."

"Steady on, old girl.  Save the drama for your plots."  Billy refilled
his glass.

Elinor stormed out.  In the entrance hall, Betty, the nanny, stood at
the bottom of the stairs.

"Might I have a word with you, madam?"  she asked.  Betty's normally
plum-coloured cheeks had flushed almost to purple.

"Certainly, Betty.  What's upset you?  Has one of the girls been
naughty" I "It's not the' little girls, ma darn Betty said
hesitantly.

"Perhaps you'd best come to the nursery and see for yourself, madam.
Now that they dress themselves, I wouldn't have noticed until bath time
tonight, but Miranda pushed Clare in the lily pond, so I had to change
her clothes."  In the sunny day nursery, Betty exhibited eight-year-old
Clare, wearing white vest and navy knickers; Elinor could see the
bruises on her upper arms.

"Maybe you could have a word with him.  He doesn't know his own
strength, madam," Betty said coldly.  She pulled Clare's hands forward;
the nails were bitten to the 0,4ajek, and the surrounding skin was
ragged from nervous

The befuddled Billy had rarely seen Elinor so angry as when she
confronted him in his study about Clare's bruises.

Elinor concluded, "If it happens once more, then you leave this house!
You are never again to hurt any of them!  I won't have U."  Billy, for
once, was horrified by what he had done: rd no idea that I was holding
Clare so hard.  I'd had a few and didn't realize .. ."

"What do you think Edward would do to you if he could see Clare's arm
sT Elinor cried.

"You couldn't bully him after he was big enough to lick you!"  "Elinor,
I'm truly sorry.  What can I do to convince you?  How do you suppose I
fee lT Billy pleaded.

"I don't care how you feel!  Just make sure I never see a bruise on
that child again!"

For once, Billy could not coax Elinor into forgiveness.

On the following morning, after a sleepless night, Elinor almost
cancelled her business trip to London, but she knew that her publisher
had taken a great deal of trouble to arrange two press interviews and
lunch at the Savoy with the W. H. Smith fiction buyer.

As Elinor was driven to the station, she waved to the three little
girls, but they did not notice.  They sat in a circle under a magnolia
tree: they had removed their sandals and socks, and- each child was
bending her head down to her foot.  Elinor smiled.  It was their latest
craze, a competition to see who could first get her toe in her mouth.
Elinor found this sight reassuring.

Elinor caught the last train from London and returned home at about ten
o'clock.  She found the house in darkness except for the lights in the
hall.  Her depression returned as she slowly mounted the polished
stairs to her bedroom, where she quickly undressed and washed, wearily
pulled on a peach chiffon nightgown, and fell into her bed.

At seven o'clock the next morning, Mabel burst into Elinor's bedroom.

"Oh madam, something awful..."  Elinor sat up abruptly.

"What's happen ed?"  "He's in the hall, madam ... He's ... lying
there!" Elinor jumped out of bed and ran down the stairs.  On the
oriental carpet at the foot of the stairs, Billy, fully dressed, lay in
a pool of vomit.  An empty bottle of brandy lay near him.  Billy's eyes
were open; they stared at the ceiling, the aquamarine now faded, the
whites yellowing, bloodshot, and glazed.

Elinor knelt by Billy and felt his cheek, which was cold.  There was
dried blood on his left temple.  He smelled of stale drink.

"Telephone the doctor," Elinor told the maid.

"And keep the children upstairs."  Kneeling by her husband, she grasped
his hand and stroked it.  She remembered his face as she had first seen
it.  How she had loved that smiling young man she had met so long ago.
But where had he gone?  Softly she began to cry, her body racked with
pain for Billy, for herself, for what might have been.

CHAPTER 6

SUNDAY, 17 JULY 1949

"Who do them scissors belong toT Buzz asked, producing them from her
pocket at the breakfast table.

"Come on!  Own up!"

Annabel and Miranda looked at each other and kept silent.

Ten-year-old Clare, spooning yoghurt, casually said, "They're from the
nursery sewing box."

"Colonel Bromley found them scissors in his greenhouse," Buzz said
tartly.

"He said someone someone not very tall had stolen his grapes."

"Sneak!"

Annabel spat at Clare.

"Shut up, Annabel," hissed Miranda, too late.

Buzz knew that further questioning was pointless because freckle-faced
Miranda would never sneak on her sister, the two were inseparable, but
although Miranda was the younger, it was always she who thought up the
devilry and led the way, while Annabel trotted after her.  Buzz said
firmly, "You two young 'uns go round and apologize to Colonel Bromley,
and ask if you can do any odd jobs in his garden this morning."

"Sneak," Annabel hissed again at Clare.

Buzz looked crossly at Clare.

"You should have stopped them."  Clare ran a hand through her short,
dark hair.

"But I didn't know ..."  As the eldest, Clare was often unfairly blamed
for their naughtiness.

"That's what you always say," Buzz scolded.

"If you didn't, you shoulda done, so you must share their
punishment."

"It's not fair!"  howled Clare.

"They're always getting me into trouble!  And Annabel always gets off
lightest!"

Buzz knew that this was true and she knew why.  Buzz, an inconspicuous
and plain child, had seen early in life that pretty, self-confident
little girls like Annabel, with charming, flirty ways, could wriggle
their way out of trouble.

"Life is unfair, Clare," Buzz said, "and the sooner you find out, the
better."  Clare scowled.  Buzz had lived with them long enough for
Clare to know that she never changed her mind or relented, as Gran
did.

After Billy's death two years earlier, Buzz had immediately gone down
to Starlings, intending to stay with Elinor for a week.  She never
returned to her hated stenographic job in the City of London.  Buzz now
handled Elinor's secretarial work, ran the household, and organized the
details of Elinor's life for a considerably larger salary than she had
been paid by the grocery-chain head office.  Furthermore, she was no
longer lonely, no longer hungry for affection.

Buzz was meticulously efficient and irritatingly critical, and a
constant but amicable battle was waged between Elinor and Buzz, the
only person who dared criticize Elinor, and who wasn't particularly
tactful about doing so.  To each of the women, these minor arguments
were proof of affection.  Their friendship could withstand the
squalls.

Buzz protected Elinor from outsiders with common sense and bulldog
ferocity.  Immediately after Billy's death, such protection had been
necessary to deal with the bureaucratic requirements; the extravagantly
vulpine suggestions of the undertaker, who naturally wanted as
expensive a funeral as possible; and the crowd of reporters that had
appeared.

In due course, the coroner concluded that, while intoxicated, Mr.
William O'Dare had fractured his neck in a fall Jrom a staircase,
vomited while unconscious, and been asphyxiated by his vomit.  The
verdict was death by misadventure.

Elinor had appeared to be dazed after Billy's death.  In public, she
did not shed one tear: she stared into space and asked to be left
alone.  Buzz knew why; she had seen mortally wounded men, fresh from
the battlefield, who could not feel pain because they had been
anaesthetized by shock.  The young local doctor had confirmed Buzz's
diagnosis to her as she showed him to the front door.

"It's often the case with widows," he said.

"They literally cwwot feel anything until they can accept the death,
which may be long after the loss of the husband."

"I'd have called it good riddance," Buzz muttered.

The doctor decided to ignore this.

"You can expect Mrs.  O'Dare to be totally unlike her normal self- she
may be bewildered, disoriented, and frightened by her own feelings.  If
she had recently quarrelled with her husband she might even feel
guilty, because now they can never kiss and make UP.

Looking at Buzz's face and remembering stories he had heard about
Billy, the doctor added, "Especially if sheer ... felt resentment
towards Mr.  O'Dare or had ... hmm ... sometimes wished him dead ... I
hear he was a difficult man."  He paused.

"On the other hand, don't be surprised if Mrs.  O'Dare's mind now
blanks out all bad memories of her husband, exaggerates the good ones,
and starts to view him as a wonderful person, in which case it is
kindest not to contradict her."

"She's been doing that for years," Buzz said sourly.

in the days that followed the funeral, Elinor felt numb and cold,
permanently weary: her movements slowed down, as if she were
sleepwalking, and any movement seemed to take a lot of effort.  She
felt wizened, as if the juice had been squeezed from her body.  For
the first time in her life, she felt old.

After a few such days, Buzz shooed Elinor to her desk.  Thanks to this,
and to her own imagination, Elinor was able to escape from her misery:
it was difficult to think about anything else when writing the first
draft of a novel.

Elinor's romances were never out-and-out bodice rippers each sexual
chase was described in detail, but once the heroine was in the hero's
arms, only a row of dots followed.  Although breasts heaved frequently
and there was a great deal of panting, the heroine always even if only
by a hairbreadth went a virgin to the marriage bed never described that
she was about to share with the dark, winged-eye browed aristocratic
gentleman on the book jacket, who was called Peregrine or Torquil and
lived on some vast country estate: Elinor's heroines never married
mechanics.

Now Elinor chose Paris as the glamorous setting for her next novel
Paris in the year 1870, when the city was besieged by the German army.
Happily she turned to planning the romantic situation, the problems
that would confront the lovers, and the solutions.  Always, in Elinor's
novels, it appeared that the heroine would be forced to choose between
two ghastly alternatives; always the plot twisted ingeniously at this
point, to provide the heroine with a third alternative and eventual
eternal happiness.  In Paris with her heroine, Elinor would once again
forget the misery of reality.

Immediately after their grandfather's death, the three small sisters
howled for days.  Clare wept from guilt as much as sorrow, blaming
herself for her grandfather's death.  It must have been that last spell
the mixture of primrose, violet roots, and sheep droppings.  She must
have wished too hard.

Miranda bellowed in sympathy, and then asked for the recipe.

"Long after her sisters had dried their tears, Annabel continued to
sob; she was afraid to go to bed in the dark and woke screaming every
night.

"She's the softy of those three," Nanny explained to Buzz.

Buzz knew that Annabel wasn't the only inhabitant of Starlings who had
a soft heart.  The former ambulance driver did not find it difficult to
be firm: she dealt briskly with truculent plumbers, lazy domestic
staff, and insolent girls behind shop counters who never ignored her.
Buzz dealt with life's small exasperations as she dealt with buzzing
gnats: she swatted at them, then dismissed them.

But after Billy died, like a punch-drunk boxer, Elinor found it
difficult to stand up for herself.  Her timid and unaggressive
behaviour and her obvious wish to avoid an argument let alone a row
left her vulnerable.

"Nell, you shouldn't let people walk all over you," Buzz scolded one
morning as they stood in the hall.

"You're a ruddy sight too generous and helpful."  She gazed through the
window at a purple figure disappearing down the drive.

"You've just given your new coat to Doreen, haven't you?"  "I know she
stole the spoons, but she said she was sorry" Elinor said
defensively.

"And it's such a cold morning for July.  She was wearing only a flimsy
cardigan."

"She's ruddy lucky not to be in prison.  And she could have worn the
green coat you gave her last year.  You're a mug, Nell."  Elinor
scowled; she preferred to see herself as warmhearted.

"And while we're on the subject, why the hell did you bail out Stinker
Baldwin?"  Buzz asked, referring to the village drunk.

"His wife came to see me, with three of the children.  She said it was
his birthday next week."  -B throw her a look of scorn.

"A ruddy good reason for getting drunk and beating her up again.
Stinker should always be in prison on his birthday.  Did you give her
money?"  Elinor hesitated.

"Just a little."

"There you go again!  And I'll bet you thought of some good reason to
do such a daft thing."

"Is it so wrong to give the poor woman a little money?"  "Yes.  Because
she'll drink it just like Stinker!  You'd have done better to give her
food in a basket."

"It would have humiliated her," Elinor said, rationalizing her
impulsive action.

"Rubbish!  She'll soon be back for more cash!"  Buzz knew how easily
Elinor was able to identify with the wretched, and how quickly the
wretched realized it.

"Well, I can afford to give it," Elinor said.

"Not at the rate you're going, my girl!  I've just balanced your
chequebook!  We send a cheque off to every blinking begging letter that
drops on the mat!  You haven't enough money or time to solve all the
problems of the world and it ain't your job."

"I only try to help people."

"Charity begins at home, Lady Bountiful.  You're a soft touch, Nell.
The girls can twist you round their little finger.  I punish 'em for
stealing grapes, so they run off to you and you dry their tears, cancel
the punishment, and give 'em chocolates.  You're far too lenient with
'em, Nell they're getting spoilt rotten."

"You see, I can't help remembering ... that the poor little things have
no parents."

"Poor they ain't!"  Buzz scoffed.

"You should put a stop to their weaknesses, not encourage 'em."  he
following morning, Buzz came into the breakfast room, shuffling
envelopes.

"Only one for you today, Nell.

And I've had a long letter from Bertha Higby."  Buzz still corresponded
with the mother of her dead fiance, Ginger Higby; in 1922, the family
had emigrated to Cleveland, Ohio, where eventually Mr.  Higby opened a
hardware store.  Reading excerpts from Bertha Higby's letter, Buzz did
not notice Elinor's face until the door burst open and the three girls
bounced into the breakfast room.

"Look what we've got for you!"  Miranda thrust a wilting bunch of wild
flowers into her grandmother's hands.

"What's wrong?"  Clare asked, looking at her grandmother's face, at her
untouched breakfast, and at the crumpled handkerchief in her hand.

It's nothing..  ."  Yes it is we can see you've been crying," Annabel
said.

"Well, that was silly of me.  I thought I might win a prize the
International Romance Writers Award, but they gave it to Daphne du
Maurier."

"Well, they're silly!"  Miranda shouted.  The three girls flung
themselves upon their grandmother and hugged her.

"We think you're the best at everything," Annabel said loyally.

"We'll make you your favourite chocolate cake," Miranda promised, "and
we'll write "Number One Gran Award" on top., Smiling at this display of
loyalty, Buzz knew that Elinor would forget her disappointment by
teatime.  Elinor had long ago acquired the knack of instantly
dismissing or forgetting anything that made her unhappy.  Buzz supposed
that this was how she had managed to survive life with Billy.  For a
moment, Buzz remembered Billy's drunken, angry, bloodshot, half-closed
eyes, yet she knew Nell remembered only the clear, sea-blue flashes
that had originally entranced her.  Over and over Nell astounded her as
she told some journalist that the reason she had not V0010tried was
that she knew she'd never find anyone to replace her darling husband.

Whether or not Nell had brainwashed herself into believing that, Buzz
knew the truth of the matter.  Elinor, now freed to fly high in the
sky, was afraid of finding herself chained to another bully.

SATURDAY, 24 MARCH 1951

"What's that noise?"  Twelve-year-old Clare, in a ginger tweed coat and
black gum boots ran to the bottom of the orchard, followed by her
sisters.  Beyond the boundary hedge was a rough meadow above which
rooks swirled in a fight blue sky.  Elinor's overgrown woods lay to the
left.  From the hill on the right came the faint sound of horses"
hooves.

Again the melancholy sound of a horn hung mournfully in the air.

"It's the hund" Clare climbed the five-barred wooden gate and sat upon
it.  Her sisters joined her, and they watched a wisp of russet streak
down the hill to their right.

Hard-hatted black heads appeared above the hill, followed by shoulders
of scarlet or black; then the heads of horses, followed by their
graceful bodies and long, delicate legs: the hunt looked an unstoppable
mass as it rushed towards the hedgerow at the base of the hill, and
even from a distance the girls could sense the exuberance of the
Warmingford Hunt in full cry on a fresh, damp day.

The hounds were gaining on the exhausted fox: streaks of black and tan,
they bayed with the excitement of the chase.

Some four hundred yards behind the hounds, a bunch of about thirty
horses and ponies now thundered down the hill.  Straggling behind were
a group of children from the Pony Club mounted on shaggy, dark ponies;
their hooves ,-threw up clods of earth as they leapt the hedge in
pursuit of the fox.

The desperate vixen was clever: several times she had thrown the hunt
off the scent by running through streams, past manure heaps, and once
through a flock of sheep.  But after being hunted for four hours, she
was bedraggled and exhausted.

"It's the vixen who lives in our woods!"  Annabel exclaimed.  Only the
previous week, the vixen had broken into the O'Dares" chicken house
again, gnawing through the planking to steal a couple of birds.

"Can't we hide her?  She's our fox; she lives in our woods."  Annabel
jumped down on the far side of the gate and started running towards the
frightened animal.

"Come back!  The hounds'll knock you- down!"  Clare shouted after her
sister, jumping down to run after her, followed closely by Miranda.

The fox was a pathetic sight; her eyes were glazed, her tongue hung out
of her mouth as she panted, and her breath came in heavy gasps.  She
slowed her pace, then staggered and swayed, unable to go farther.

When Annabel was about ten yards away, the hounds caught up with the
vixen, who had no chance.  Weakly she turned her head and bared her
teeth at her tormentors; then the leading hounds flung themselves at
the fox's body, each seizing whatever part of her flesh it could reach.
The rest of the pack piled on top of the exhausted animal, like a
rugger sc rum upon the ball.

As the hunt cantered down the hill towards the kill, Clare recognized a
couple of local farmers, the vet, and Colonel Bromley on a well-groomed
bay.

"You girls!  Keep out of the way!"  shouted the Master of the Hunt.
Mounted on a grey, he was a splendid sight in scarlet coat, white
breeches, and black boots with tanned tops.

 .-you damn, damn, damn bastards!"  screamed Miranda, using forbidden
swear-words.

"You damn, damn murderers!"  yelled Annabel.

Colonel Bromley, in black bowler and beige raincoat, moved towards the
girls.

"Don't be sentimental," he said.

"Foxes kill my lambs, my pheasants, and your chickens.  You mustn't cry
over a fox.  Hunting keeps the foxes down, and it isn't as cruel as
other killing methods."  Clare sobbed, "Why can't you kill the foxes
some other way?  With traps or with poison?"  "Farmers can't put down
poison, in case their working dogs eat it.  And if an animal is
trapped, it might be held in fearful pain for days."

"Well, shoot them!  That's fast and not so cruel," Annabel shouted.

"Farmers can't sit up all night waiting to shoot foxes."

"I'm glad I'm not the sort of person who hounds an animal to death for
fun," Annabel shrieked, "and then watches while other animals tear it
to pieces!"

"Keep your voice down," Colonel Bromley said.

"Your grandmother will not be pleased if you upset the Master."

"We don't care, you bloodthirsty old pig!"  Annabel shouted.

Colonel Bromley looked at them in silence, and kept his horse between
the girls and the rest of the hunt until it had moved off.

Two hours later, when Elinor and Buzz returned from a shopping trip,
the sisters were in the orchard burying what was left of the fox.

Having heard the car come up the drive, the girls hurled themselves at
the returning travellers before they had time to unbutton their
coats.

When Elinor disentangled their story, she said indignantly, "I'd like
to see the Master after he'd been hunted for four hours by huge
bloodthirsty, baying creatures I bet that'd change his point of viewt
Expensive dressing-up can't disguise barbarity."  Later, Elinor skimmed
the hand-delivered letter from Colonel Bromley: '... undisciplined ...
worse than hooligans ... no more disturbance ... police ... their
headmistress..."

"Around here you can't upset the hunt without running into trouble,"
Buzz said.

"And the Master of the Hunt has complained to the police.  You'd better
lay on the charm, old girl."  Elinor looked worried.  She had now been
accepted by local society, but she knew that, should she argue against
the hunt, she would be ... well, not exactly ostracized but ... "The
girls were absolutely right to behave as they did," Elinor said
firmly.

Nevertheless, hoping to circumvent any further complaint from the
Master of the Hunt, Elinor saw Sergeant Brown, who was well aware of
her generous annual cheque for the police widows and orphans fund.
Elinor also visited the headmistress of the local school.

"Frankly, I'm not surprised to hear of this behaviour from Annabel,"
said Miss Pryor.

"She behaves as if she were an only child."  Spoiled, selfish,
imperious, was what she didn't say.

"Annabel is overshadowed by her sisters," Elinor rationalized, "because
Clare is clever and Miranda has a very strong character."

"Annabel is certainly jealous of her sisters," Miss Pryor said firmly.
Overprivileged little tyrant, she thought.

"Had you considered sending them to boarding school?  Not Benenden or
Heathfield somewhere where they'd learn to fend for themselves."

After a long pause, Elinor said, "I'll think about it."  She went home
and telephoned Joe Grant.

TUESDAY, 27 MARCH 1951

On the back lawn, swaying golden stretches of daffodils bent before a
wind that swept scudding clouds from the sky; they looked like fat
cupids being shooed off to bed by Nanny, Elinor thought.  She pulled
her coat collar up and turned to Joe.  After a delicious meal of grouse
and an excellent claret, he was dutifully admiring the daffodils: they
ran down to a stream that wandered along the back of the garden, under
pale green fronds of weeping willows.

Elinor laughed with excitement as the trees rustled before the frisky
March wind.  Her blonde hair whipped around her cheeks.

"I feel as if my face has been dipped in a snowdrift, Joe.  Isn't it
exhilarating?"

"It's damned cold."  Joe left his garden to the gardener and only
enjoyed looking at it from behind snugly closed, draught-proofed
windows.

"I don't know why you want my advice," he added.

"You're perfectly capable of making up your own mind."

"A woman needs a man to guide her."  Elinor smiled at him.

"I know how lucky I am to be guided by you.  Thank you for that income
forecast, by the way."

"You could do that sort of forecast much more cheaply from here if you
had a bookkeeper in once a month."  Elinor looked up at Joe with
gratitude.

"You see?  Bookkeeping is the sort of thing that I simply don't know
about so it would never have occurred to me to do that forecast.
Remember that the girls of my generation had no business training."

"Business training is useful but not all-important," Joe said.

"Common sense and hard work are just as important.  What a business
boils down to is having a product, or a and selling it, and that
applies whether your product is a book or a bulldozer.  You increase
your income in two ways: by decreasing costs and by increasing prices,
or production."

"But that doesn't apply to an author."

"Oh yes it does.  I think you should try to dictate your books.  You'd
double your output.  Incidentally, I've arranged for that history
professor to correct your manuscript; he'll pass it on to an English
professor, to check the grammar and spelling."

"Of course I learned Yankee Spelling," Elinor said, "but then I ended
up over here, and now I can't spell in either language.  But I didn't
ask you here today to talk business."  In answer to Joe's raised
eyebrows, she added, "I want you to advise me about the girls."  Joe
laughed.

"You've always said that Ethel and I are too harsh with our boys.  But
boys need discipline and so do girls.  I've always told you that you
should send those girls to boarding school when they're old enough.
It's not fair to keep them at the village school so you can have them
at home with you.  They'll suffer for it later.  Quite frankly, it's
your duty to send them somewhere where they'll get an excellent
education and be among the sort of girls that they'll mix with socially
when they grow up."

"I want .. ."  Elinor paused.

"I never want them to feel the sort of amused and supercilious contempt
that I ran up against when I met Billy's family.  I don't want them
ever to know that sort of anxiety and humiliation.  I want those girls
to be the social equal of anybody."

"You are the equal of anyone," Joe said angrily, "and you always were!
Billy was lucky to have you."  He remembered Elinor's vitality, her
cheerfulness and popularity in that Frenchie hospital where he had
visited Billy so long ago.  He remembered her wedding day, when Elinor
carried a bouquet of white chrysanthemums, which Joe personally had
liberated from what was left of somebody's garden.

"We were all a bit in love with you, Elinor with your vitality and
warmth but Billy made sure that nobody else got a chance to get near
you."  Fiercely Joe added, "Billy married you because you were the
prettiest girl he'd ever seen, and he wasn't the only one who thought
that!"  He smiled at her.

"And now you're a beautiful woman.  But I don't suppose I'm the only
man to tell you so."  Elinor looked delighted.

"Nobody's told me for a long time, Joe."  Joe glanced lovingly at
her.

"The only possible reason is that you don't allow a man to get close
enough to say so.

But you need a man in your life, Elinor.  You're still young enough to
enjoy ... male companionship."

"Men want more than companionship.  I don't want to lead a man on and
then refuse him," Elinor said.

"Because I shall never remarry.  Nobody could ever replace Billy in ...
in certain ways."  She looked Joe straight in the eye and softly added,
"And as I'm sure you realize, I would never have an affair, Joe." 
Well, Joe thought, he'd hinted and she'd given him her reply.  He
smiled again and put his arm affectionately around Elinor's shoulder.

"About the girls," she said.

"As you know, I want them to have the best I can give them, Joe.  A
proper society debut.  And I want you to tell me how to arrange it."
Joe understood at once what she meant.  He had come a long way himself
and knew that Elinor wanted her family to go a lot farther.  He looked
at the little girls playing on the front lawn.

"If that's what you want, I can certainly help you," he said.

"But remember that too much privilege can be a disaster."  Briefly he
thought of one or two of Adam's arrogant friends at Eton.

Elinor nodded.

"That's what I want."  4%joe said, "You start by getting a better car."
it's almost impossible to get any car!  The dealers" waiting lists are
years long!"  I "I think I could get you a prewar white Rolls.  Chap I
know wants to get rid of his."

"But I can't drive a Rolls-Royce!  It's far too heavy."

"No," Joe agreed, "you'll need a chauffeur.  And the first place he
should drive you to is Norman Hartnell."

"I can't afford the Queen's dressmaked"

"Hartnell is the best designer of appearance clothes, and that's why
the Queen goes to him.  And you can afford it if you produce more
books.  You must dress the part before you play the part."  He added,
As you no doubt know, you can only be presented at Court by a lady who
has herself been presented.  I'll arrange for someone to present you
next year and give you a season in London.  I happen to now that Sonia
Rushleigh came out of her divorce badly, and she needs money."

"But how can I spare the time for a London season, Joe, if I'm writing
books to pay for it?  "Get up earlier."

"That's what Billy always told me."  Hastily Joe said, "About the
girls. Finishing school in.  Switzerland or Paris, where they'll
acquire all the social graces.  They must all be able to"

Spark leT Elinor suggested, tongue in cheek.  When Joe nodded, she
said, "They already sparkle.  What else do they need to know?"  "Only
seven things."  Joe ticked them off on brown leather-gloved fingers.

"One, never criticize the royal family, blood sports, or newspaper
owners, because they gang up to protect each other.  Two, don't get any
publicity in the cheaper papers during the season.  Three, pick a
newsworthy charity to support, preferably connected with dogs or
children.  Four, support your local community and make sure you're
seen doing it.  Open the vicarage fete, and when you do it, publicly
present a cheque for the church roof that sort of thing."  As they drew
near the front door, he shivered.

"Dear Elinor, I think I've had enough nature for one day.  Can we
please, please, get back to that log fire in your study?"  Elinor
laughed.

"Not till you've finished."  Joe wrapped his arms across his chest to
keep warm.

"Five, show an interest in one of the arts, but nothing too avant-garde
ballet or the opera is fine."  He quickened his step as they arrived at
the front door.

"Six, buy some place that people long to be invited to somewhere like
Somerset Maugham's villa on Cap Ferrat.  There's a place called St
Tropez that's getting popular."

"And the seventh commandment?"  Elinor asked.

"Always write thank-you letters immediately and post them within three
days."  Joe grinned.

Elinor looked guilty.  She hated writing letters, especially letters of
thanks; instead of dashing them off while she still felt grateful, she
delayed until the last minute before she risked offending people.  At
that point, she would contritely write several pages, invent some
reason to explain why she hadn't written before, feel guilty about her
lie, and send flowers.

Elinor pushed open the ancient oak front door.

"But all that you've just suggested will cost a fortune!"

"Then make one, Elinor."  Buzz looked dubious when she heard about
Elinor's plans for the girls" future, starting with boarding school.

"Don't you think you're being a bit old-fashioned, Nell?"  she said.

"I know you want them girls to have what you didn't, but you ain't
realized that by protecting a woman you leave her unprotected if she's
ever left on her own."  Fleetingly Buzz remembered what it had felt
like, after her home had been bombed in the Second World War, suddenly
to be without a family, without anyone.

When Miranda heard that her two sisters were going to be sent away to
school in the autumn but that she wasn't old enough, she raged,
proclaiming she was sick of being the littlest, because she was always
left out.  Eventually Elinor yielded; Miranda could accompany her
sisters.

SATURDAY, 29 SEPTEMBER 1951

Hazlehurst Park Manor School was only thirty miles away from Warminster
- a minor reason for Elinor's choice.  It was a nineteenth-century
reconstruction of an eighteenthcentury reconstruction of a Gothic
priory.  All the teachers were clearly ladies who had known better
times in better years; they seemed amiable and well-meaning, but were
by no means intellectuals.

On their first Saturday afternoon away from home, the three sisterS7
who were not allowed in each other's dormitories felt lonely and
homesick. Together, they walked down the school's drive, heading for
the nearest sweetshop.

"I can't think why Gran sent us to this prison!"  Annabel grumbled.

"Because she wants us to be ladies," Clare said gloomily.

Miranda added, "Because she was put through hell by all the ladies when
she was a young bride."

"They don't like us here."  Annabel kicked at the bracken by the side
of the road.

"They don't know us yet," Clare pointed out.

"How will we know when they like us?"  Miranda asked, darting forward
to pick up a spiked greenish ball that enclosed a shining conker.

"When they share their secrets with us," Clare said.

SOO11, Of course, secrets were exchanged.  All three girls quickly
learned that the period after lights-out was a time when the girls of
Hazlehurst Park, amid steady giggles, shared their common fascination
with boys and sex.

These inaccurate accounts of the strange things that adults did to each
other in bed in order to achieve ecstasy, combined with the behaviour
of the demurely romantic but firmly virginal heroines of Elinor's
novels, gave the sisters an odd picture of adult coupling: this
involved a wildly romantic waltz into the future, wearing a low-necked
dress as if you didn't realize that your top was showing.  After your
wedding, you had to allow your husband to see you naked without being
embarrassed, and let him kiss you hard, an action which fused true twin
souls together, to think as one, after which no verbal communication
was needed.  Your true love, now your husband, would read your
thoughts, enjoy everything you liked to do, and give you everything You
wanted, including spotless babies; that was his function in life.

A few weeks into the girls" second term, in February Joe said it was
the best time to buy and the worst time to sell property in Europe
Elinor and Buzz flew to France for a week, during which Elinor
purchased a small but pretty villa on the outskirts of St-Tropez; the
sea could be seen beyond the pink oleander bushes at the end of the
small garden.  Sufficient funds for the purchase were obtained by Joe
Grant, who had Elinor's French publisher make the financial
arrangements.

MONDAY, 6 JULY 1953 By early July of the following year, Elinor's villa
had been redecorated, furnished with simple Provengal furniture, and
curtained with intricately patterned, bright traditional country
fabrics.  She invited Joe Grant and his family to be her first guests.
It was arranged that his son Adam should fly to Nice in advance of the
rest of the family, who were to drive through France.

Before the visit, the two Grant sons were much discussed by the O'Dare
sisters, who had not seen the boys for several years.  On the day of
Adam's arrival, the girls took three hours to dress in cinch-wasted,
flowery dresses that were both too tight for the temperature and too
elaborate for the occasion; they then sat on the patio for nearly two
hours, none admitting that she was waiting for Adam.

At last, as late-afternoon shadows crept across the patio, Adam, in
naval blazer and open-necked white shirt, sauntered through the living
room.  As he did so, he again wondered whether his father was having or
had ever had an affair with Elinor O'Dare.  They seemed unusually close
for friends of the opposite sex, and Adam had noticed his mother's
almost imperceptible withdrawal when in the same room as Elinor: it was
something that Adam had noticed in rival cats.

Adam, now twenty-three years old, had spent his two years of national
service in the navy, where lae obtained a commission; he had decided to
be a lawyer, and in due course became articled to the family firm of
Swithin, Timmins and Grant, this being the simplest way to obtain his
legal qualifications.

When he wasn't studying, Adam acted as his father's assistant and was
also loaned to any of the firm's other lawyers who needed a spare pair
of hands to prepare a case: while the senior lawyer conducted the main
interviews, Adam ran around acquiring the evidence and bringing it into
the office, where he checked it and then sorted it into appropriate
files.  He now looked forward to a luxurious holiday in the sun, during
which he would not be treated like the messenger boy.

I On, the wide steps that led from Elinor's living room down to the
patio, Adam paused, grinned, and said, "Why, it's the three Graces!"

This was the first time that the sisters heard the tag-line destined to
be pinned on them; they were flattered and dazzled by a compliment from
this tall, tanned young man with dark hair and big brown eyes.  All
three immediately fell in love with him.

That evening, before going down to dinner, fourteen year-old Clare
stuffed socks in the sides of her bra, which pushed her small breasts
together.  She had heard about this trick at Hazlehurst, though it
didn't quite accomplish the look she was striving for.

Annabel sneaked Gran's new camera and flash so that she could take
photographs of everyone, and made sure that she took more of Adam than
anyone else.

That night, Miranda hugged her pillow and daydreamed about being with
Adam in his private plane: "Oh my God, Miranda, I feel a touch of my
old malaria coming on ... Do you think you can manage to land her?"
Wearing a glamorous white flying suit and leather helmet, Miranda said,
"Of course, Adam, simply tell me what to do."  Adam gasped out the
instructions before losing consciousness ... When the girls came down
for breakfast the following morning they found that Adam had already
left to charter speedboat.  He did not return for lunch.  That
afternoon, Clare was lying on the beach, sleepy as cat in the sun, when
she felt a shadow fall across her face.  She opened her eyes and knew
instantly that the young man standing before her in scarlet swim trunks
was Adam's brother; they had the same flyaway dark eyebrows that almost
met in the middle.  But Adam's face was leaner, his mouth tauter, his
eyebrows drawn closer to each other.  Adam's finely cut features looked
Clare now had to admit just a little bit twitchy, like Gregory Peck
when worried about what the villain was going to do next.

The young man stared at her navy-blue school swimsuit.

"Are you Clare?  I'm Mike."  Mike's clear grey eyes, set wide apart,
gave him an air of transparent honesty that he found very useful in
getting out of trouble at school.  He added, "I've been sent to find
you.  Adam hired a motorboat and we're taking it to the islands.  Like
to come alone."  Mike looked less cynically amused and more
approachable than Adam, although there was something violent about his
stillness, as if his body wanted to leap forward.  Mike had even longer
legs and wider shoulders than Adam; dark hair curled crisply on his
chest and descended in a faint line to below his navel.

Clare almost fell out of love with Adam.  Later, as the motorboat
cleaved the water, trailing churning foam in its wake, each sister felt
similar turmoil beneath her breastbone.  They all returned to the villa
dazed by a love far more exhausting than that which Clare had felt for
the tow-haired games mistress, Annabel for Robin, her pony, and Miranda
for the milkman.

The next day, the five of them drove to the long sandy crescent of
Tahiti Beach; here each sister, for the first time, felt the painful
and humiliating sorrow of rejection.

Adam and Michael took one look at the lithe, suntanned young Frenchmen
flirting with feline French girls in sexy bikinis and made no attempt
to hide the fact that this was their idea of paradise.  The two
Englishmen immediately lost interest in the three young sisters.

That evening, none of the sisters came down to supper.  Buzz found
them, still wearing swimsuits, in Clare's bedroom.  Clare was crying,
face down on the bed.  Also sobbing', Annabel was spread-eagled, face
down, on the floor.  A scowling Miranda leaned against the wall with
legs crossed and arms folded.

"What are you all moaning about?"  "Go away, Buzz it's none of your
business," Clare hiccuped.

"I'll never, never love anyone again," Annabel sobbed.

"They're both beasts," growled Miranda.

"And we must all buy bikinis as fast as possible."

"Don't be silly little geese," Buzz chided.

"Adam's twenty three years old and Mike's twenty-one!  Of course they
like the look of them curvy, pretty French ladies!"

"But Mike was charming to Clare before he saw those girls on the beach,
"Annabel gulped.

"Adam showed Miranda how to water-ski before he saw those old bags, but
after that, he ignored her!"  cried Clare.

"Frog is just as pretty as those beastly tarts on the sand," Miranda
said, scowling again.

"Don't use that nasty word, or I'll give you what for," Buzz corrected
automatically.

"Of course the lads were polite to you because they're nice lads."  She
hesitated and then said firmly, "To them lads, you're still only
kiddies.  Now have a wash and come downstairs there's chocolate
meringues for supper.  And no more of this nonsense about bikinis. What
would Annabel and Miranda put in the top bit tennis balls?"

CHAPTER 7

TUESDAY, 21 JULY 1953

At the crossroads, Adam pulled the wheel of the family Humber to the
left: in the moonlight, the silver road ahead disappeared between dark
conifers.

"Hey, Adam, you've gone the wrong way," Michael said, waking from his
reverie.

"You've taken the road to Nice."

Adam turned left again on to the coast road; below them lay the dark
glitter of the sea.

"We're not going to Nice, we're going to Cannes to the casino."  Mike
laughed.

"I suppose that's why you offered to drive old Maclean back to his
villa."  Mike knew that his brother was an opportunist.

"And why I asked you to come along.  It was pretty early for old
Maclean to leave Elinor's dinner party, pleading a -headache.  I reckon
he's jumping into bed with something juicy at this very moment."

"Dad'll kill us.if he finds out we've been gambling," Mike said.  Adam
laughed and pressed the accelerator.

"Dad's determined that we're not going to take after his dad."  Joe
Grant's father had been a racecourse bookie, a fact that his wife tried
to hide.  Granddad Grant never gambled he took the money from gamblers.
He always said that gambling was a mug's game."

"Look, Mike, do you want a night out or not?  If so, stop being so
bloody pious."  Adam's persuasive nature and elder brother's
self-assurance overshadowed his brother, who quickly gave up arguing.

"Sp-rry.  it's a great idea," Mike said hastily.

"After all, we cdn "It gamble at home."  Gambling was illegal in
Britain, supposedly because of its bad effect on public morality.

"But what'll we do for money?"  "I've got four weeks" wages," Adam
said. Through the open car windows, he could now feel salt air on his
face and smell the beguiling aroma of pine.

"Surely forty quid won't get us far in the Cannes casino?"  "It'll get
us in.  We have a drink at the bar, we look at the glitterati, we have
a mild Rutter.  That's all.  Easy."  But Mike knew that behind Adam's
supercilious sophistication and condescending faa de his brother was
unsure of himself.  Talking down to Mike always subdued Adam's own
anxiety.  Mike made Adam feel equal to anything or anyone, because Mike
always assumed that his elder brother would be successful in everything
he did, and Adam assumed that Mike would always fetch and carry, jump
to obey him, and protect his secrets.

Adam could confide anything to Mike and Mike wouldn't raise an eyebrow
or tell anyone: Mike had worshipped Adam through their lonely
childhood, in which neither brother had ever felt close to their rather
cold parents who seemed to love neither their children nor each other.
The boys had spent their early years with a rota of swiftly changing
nannies, who never seemed able to reach Mrs.  Grant's imperiously high
standards.  Adam and Mike had shared an expensively efficient, forlorn,
and loveless life in the nursery, devoid of any tenderness except that
which they had shown to each other.  Now each knew that he could depend
on the other, and neither really trusted anyone else.

As Adam drove the Humber a little too fast towards the casino, Mike
sighed.  It was such a beautiful night.-Perfect for a bike ride.
Wistfully he remembered his first night rides on the Norton Dominator
with the feather-bed his first brand-new bike.  Motorbikes were Mike's
on.  When he was fourteen, he had acquired his first a second-hand army
surplus BSA M2o; it was a messenger bike with a bouncy saddle and no
suspension.  Mike had concealed it in an unused potting shed, where it
was later joined by an equally ancient Triumph Speed Twill 500, which
had a lot of poke for its size.  None of his subsequent smarter bikes
had given him as much pleasure as those two.

At the Palm Beach Casino considered more chic than the Casino Municipal
the brothers produced their passports and purchased chips with which to
gamble: to avoid theft, cash bets weren't allowed at the table.

Waiters glided around the gaming room; cigarette girls proffered their
trays.  A couple of security men in dark uniforms stood, immobile,
although their eyes never stopped moving.

"They're shills," Adam murmured as he stared at the "Iving stools
glamorously dressed women who sat on revo before the long bar, their
sophisticated faces reflected in the mirrored rear wall.

"Their job is to get the punters to play the tables."

At the bar, Adam and Mike ordered whisky sodas, sniffing the agreeable
odour of good food and expensive perfume; they swivelled their stools
around to watch the gambling.

An effervescent excitement hovered above the sixteen tables.  People
stood around them, the men in dinner jackets and the women wearing long
strapless dresses cut to display dicolletage.  A few elderly ladies sat
firmly clutching their purses, their wrinkled bosoms bulging over
strapless net bodices.  The gamblers seemed to be mostly French,
German, or Greek, although Mike heard a couple of Englishmen playing at
a nearby table while their noisily disapproving wives worried about
British currency restrictions.

-Wall, how do we start?"  Michael asked.

"You'd better tell me what the form is.  I was never asked to any of
the smart games at Eton."  The Grant brothers were not nearly so rich
or aristocratic as most of their schoolfellows.

"I haven't the slightest idea," Adam was obliged to admit.

"I'll show you if you like," offered a pale, angular Englishman who sat
next to Adam.

"The name's Giles Milroy Browne  You should start on roulette most
beginners do, because you need no knowledge to start playing."

The three men drifted to the nearest roulette table and stood behind
the players.  Here the atmosphere was tense, the anxiety level high,
and the action very fast.  The three croupiers handsome, clean-cut
young men in immaculate dinner jackets moved with great speed as they
called out the winning numbers or paid winnings.

"The easiest way to bet is simply to gamble that the ball will fall in
a red or a black slot," Mr.  Milroy-Browne explained to Adam.

"There are thirty-six slots and the odds are even, which means that if
you put two thousand francs on, you win two thousand.  If you "play the
dozens", you gamble on which of three sequences of twelve numbers the
ball will fall in and that pays two to one.  But the most exciting and
dangerous way to play is to bet the numbers.  Actually pick one number
because the casino pays out thirty-five to one.  So, if you put a
thousand francs down, you get thirty-five thousand back."  Carefully
Adam bet, on red, a chip that cost the equivalent of one pound.  He
felt a rush of anxiety as the ball clattered around the wheel, slower
... and slower It settled in a red slot, number 3. Adam had won!  He
lost his winnings on the next throw, but told himself that it didn't
matter because, overall, he'd lost nothing.  Still, he trembled as he
laid the equivalent of ten pounds a week's pay on red.  But suddenly
Adam no longer felt self ous and anxious; he felt sophisticated and
excited.  although determined to play modestly with small kes, he
nevertheless felt a weird new impulse: a need to challenge fate.

Again red won!  Adam felt his fingers and toes tingle.  Then, as if it
didn't belong to him, he watched his right hand carefully place twenty
pounds on red.  It would hurt if he lost, but the pain would feel
exquisite ... Again the ball fell into a red slot!  Clearly, he had
been right to bet on red.  It was as though he were guided in his
choice by some invisible, benevolent force.  He felt as if he were
breathing rare air, and a tremendous sense of well-being flooded his
body.

Adam did not always win, but he lost very little.  Playing roulette
seemed a begailingly easy way of getting rich in a couple of hours,
without doing any work.  It was as if money grew on trees and Adam
merely had to stretch out his hand to pluck banknotes.  Each time he
won, he felt release, and relief, as with a sexual encounter.  Winning
made him feel more manly, more virile.  It also made him feel different
from the other people gathered around the table: Adam had thi golden
Jouch; he was favoured by the gods.

Two hours later, when Adam had won a total of one hundred pounds the
equivalent of ten weeks" salary Michael whispered in his ear, "Stop
now, Adam, while you're ahead, you silly ass.  You know it's a mug's
game.  You know that the only people who win are the organizers, the
casinos, the bookies."

"Shut up and let me concentrate."  Adam shook off the restraining arm,
but he knew that Michael was right.  Adam looked at his pile of
winnings; he should take them now and leave.  Leave!  Leave!  But he
couldn't.  Just one more bet then he would go.

tut Adam could no more stop himself than an alcoholic could stop
himself from picking up an open bottle of whisky.

His earlier tentativeness had vanished and he now looked around the
table with increasing confidence; no longer was he merely a junior
articled clerk.  As he had always subconsciously suspected, Adam was
one of God's chosen.  He began to experience a feeling of power: if he
concentrated, then that little white ball would obediently fall where
he wished it to.

The exhilaration of winning made Adam feel a little high and a lot
larger than life.  His heart pounded, adrenalin coursing through his
blood.  He was almost ill with excitement, this dark joy that spread
throughout his body, making him feel aglow, as if his veins were red
neon tubes.

Michael, who had not bet at all, returned to Adam's side at two o'clock
in the morning and suggested once again thattheyleave.

"No, not yet."  Adam looked at his pile of winnings, which totalled a
hundred and eighty pounds.

"Okay," he relented.

"Just let me have one more' bet  Half expecting to lose, he put his
original ten-pound stake on a number 36.

The ball rolled into slot 36.  Adam had just won thirty-five times his
stake!  The croupier paid him three hundred and fifty pounds almost a
year's pay!  Inside his head, Adam shrieked with joy, for he knew that
his winnings were not due to blind chance.  He felt as if he were
smelling the hair of the most beautiful woman on earth and inhaling the
perfume of her skin: Lady Luck was at his side.

After that first casino visit, Mike refused to accompany his brother.
Their father, who believed that Adam had found a girlfriend, winked as,
each night, he handed over the car keys.

Sometimes Adam won and sometimes he lost.  After ten days, he had won a
total of more than two years" salary, and in a manner far more exciting
than doing the donkey work for some lawyer.

On the tenth evening, Adam started to lose steadily.  At first he
didn't worry because he knew he'd win it all back on the next throw.

But by two o'clock in the morning, when Adam usually left the casino,
he had lost over six hundred pounds and could hardly believe it.  He
felt the desolate despair of a man who discovers his loved one in bed
with somebody else.  He felt guilty and ashamed.  How could he stupidly
have lost so much money so fast?  It had taken him two weeks to win six
hundred pounds and then he had lost it in less than an hour.  Why
hadn't he stuck to his system?  Adam had abandoned the system he had
decided upon, because at times, in order to follow it, he had to stop
gambling and he was now unable to do this: he felt so strongly that his
luck would return on the next throw ... in a few minutes ... within an
hour ... Adam slowly left the casino and, in a daze, drove home.  His
clothes felt crumpled and grubby, and as he slumped in the driving
seat, he felt depressed, as if he were about to catch influenza.

"Adam seems down in the dumps," Mrs.  Grant said to her husband the
next day at sundown, as she tucked the Ambre Solaire bottle into her
beach bag.

"He turned down that invitation to visit the Boccasso yacht, and he's
spoken to nobody all day.  He ignored that nice girl he water-skied
with yesterday.

Adam's father could not keep back a grin.

"I think he's got a woman tucked away," he said in a man-of-the-world
voice.

"He's clearly had a row with her."

"But why hasn't he brought her to the beach?"  A new thought-struck
Mrs. Grant.

"Joe, do you think she's a ... shop girl type?"  "She's more likely to
be one of the married women on the beach with young children.  Nothing
to do after the little 'uns have been put to bed ... husband slaving
away somewhere ... No, Ethel, you're to say nothing to Adam.  He's
twenty-three, he's spent two years in the navy, and he won't thank a
mother who tries to interfere in his love life."  On the following day,
Adam found it hard to get out of bed.  He only did so eventually
because he knew that if he didn't his mother would call a doctor, and
then maybe he wouldn't be able to get to the casino that evening.

All day, Adam baked his body on the beach as feelings of apathy and
lethargy swaddled him like a wet, dark fog.  He couldn't eat or drink.
He could only wonder if his luck would turn tonight at the casino.

One of the great failings of gamblers is to follow their losses.  Adam
did this, returning each evening to lose.  He kept hoping that the next
throw would cancel out those losses.  It never did.

He borrowed thirty pounds from Giles Milroy-Browne who by now knew
quite a lot about Adam's background, but he didn't win it back.

Two days before he was due to return to London Adam sold his gold
wristwatch a twenty-first birthday present, but when he attempted to
repay his borrowing Milroy Browne refused to accept the money, saying
that the debt could wait.

By midnight, Adam had lost the proceeds from the sale of his watch.

Giles lent him a further fifty pounds, which Adam also lost.

Adam left the south of France deeply grateful and three hundred pounds
in debt to the obliging Mr.  Milroy Browne, who said there was no
hurry, Adam could repay it when convenient.  Adam agreed to pay one per
cent interest per month on this debt.

Adam was not unduly worried.  When he returned to London, where
gambling was illegal, he'd go to a private gambling party and make it
back.

He was simply, temporarily, on a losing streak.

CHAPTER 8

SATURDAY, 15 DECEMBER 1956

"Do you think it will stop snowing before lunch?  It's so boring
indoors with nothing to do."  Kneeling on a window seat,
sixteen-year-old Annabel twisted her blonde ponytail with one finger as
she pressed her nose to the diamond leaded panes of the drawing-room
window.  Seen through flickering snowflakes, the garden that encircled
Starlings was a lumpy white blanket; beyond it, the bony branches of
the orchard were weighed down by snow.

Annabel turned to look at her two sisters: Miranda was waltzing around
the piano, tartan skirt aswirl.  Clare, in a black batwing sweater and
black stretch pants, lay on the carpet in front of the fire, reading a
book.

Two years before, Clare had left her smart boarding school for an
equally smart finishing school in Lausanne.  No dreary secretarial
school threatened the three sisters; neither Elinor nor Buzz considered
it necessary: of course, the girls were destined for marriage.

At the finishing school, Clare had not learned to speak French, cook,
sew, or write business letters; she had learned to jitterbug, to apply
make-up, and not much else, except to glide downstairs gracefully.

By the time Clare returned from her year in Switzerland, Elinor had
planned her eldest granddaughter's social debut with the painstaking
thoroughness that she reserved for her book launches.  So Clare was
photographed regularly at chic events for the newspaper gossip columns
or for Tatler, high society's picture magazine.  Lady Rushleigh
presented her to the Queen at Buckingham Palace.  Clare 16o wore a
slim, white satin dress that looked like an" up-ended arum fily; she
hated it because it was so different from the white net crinolines of
the other d8butantes, which was why Elinor had chosen it.

Clare then devoted herself to the exhausting life of pleasure that
constituted a London season, during which a girl was introduced, at
great expense, to society.  Clare, like all the other girls, was
conscious of the unspoken hope that she might 'meet someone nice" by
which all the mothers of the debutantes meant someone well-born and
rich.

She went to debutante lunches, at which girls became acquainted, and
then she was made to rest at home during the afternoon, in order to
save her strength for the cocktail parties, dinners, dances, or balls
of the evening.  She cheered loudly at the Oxford and Cambridge boat
race, clapped sedately during cricket at Lord's, clamped binoculars to
her eyes at Ascot, ate strawberries and cream between tennis matches at
Wimbledon, held her breath with excitement at the clash of polo sticks
at Cowdray Park and Cirencester, appreciatively sniffed the Chelsea
Flower Show, and admired the mediocre pictures at the Royal Academy
summer opening: at the previous year's exhibition, Pietro Annigoni's
romantic portrait of the Queen looking remarkably like Ingrid Bergman
had drawn unprecedented crowds, but this year there was no
showstopper..  Finally, having sent thick, properly engraved invitation
cards from Smythsons, Clare appeared at her own comin gout ball, which
was held at the Orangery in Holland Park.  A new young designer, David
Hicks, had turned the place into a white net, candlelit fairyland.

During Clare's debut, inevitably Elinor also attracted a lot of
publicity.  By now Elinor Dove had become a legendary figure, beloved
by thousands of hopeful girls and women whose dreams were disappointed
but not yet dashed.  Briskly recirculated stories of the former farm
girl's struggles against adversity, her growing fortune, and what she
spent it on were tangible proof to Elinor's readers that fairy stories
could come true.  As charmingly professional to photographers as HM the
Queen Mother, Elinor was constantly photographed: descending from her
white Rolls-Royce in glittering ball gowns, beaming in white fox furs,
cuddling photogenic white Pekinese, or smiling from beneath one of her
elaborate apricot hats she had decided that apricot was 'her colour'.

Two steps behind her, Clare sometimes felt as if she were one of her
grandmother's accessories something more important than Elinor's
handbag but less important than her five-strand pearl necklace: merely
a part of the glamorous picture that she so carefully presented to her
public.

By the end of the season, Clare felt that she never wanted to shake
another hand or clap her white gloves just hard enough to sound
enthusiastic but softly enough to be polite.  She had acquired a lot of
dancing partners, about five regular escorts, and plenty of girlfriends
with whom to giggle about them.  Clare knew that she was a lucky, lucky
girl, and she hoped that she would never have to make the debutante
round again: a life of pleasure left her feeling exhausted and
curiously empty.

Although she dared not say so, Clare thought she had wasted the year.
She tried to explain this to Annabel, who would shortly be exposed to
the same blaze of pleasure and publicity, but Annabel did not
understand her sister's warning.  Annabel, after her first term at a
Swiss finishing school, longed for the boys, the balls, and the ball
gowns; she longed to be photographed for society magazines and couldn't
wait to dance until dawn in the arms of a man preferably an older
one.

But that was later.  Right now Annabel was stuck with her sisters,
snowbound at Starlings, which was not her idea "of fun.  She jumped
down from the drawing-room window "Clare, let's have another bridge
lesson."  Clare looked up and yawned.

"Not enough time before lunch."  When the telephone rang, like a black
cat Clare flung herself towards it.

"Hello?"  she cried hopefully, then, disappointment in her voice, said,
"Sorry, Buzz, but I'm expecting an important call."  She crashed the
phone back on its cradle.

"I bet it's Henry," teased Miranda.  it can't be Henry."  Annabel
returned to the window seat.

"Henry's regiment's still in Suez."

"Shut up, both of you!"  Clare snapped.

Again the telephone rang.  Clare leapt from the sofa, but Miranda had
snatched up the receiver.

"Who's speaking?.... CND?  What's that?  The Campaign for Nuclear
Disarmament ... I think you have the wrong number."

"It's for me!"  Clare blushed violently, grabbed the telephone, made an
appointment to meet someone in London, and replaced the receiver.

"Who was that Annabel asked.

"What was that abouff Miranda chimed in.

"None of your business," growled Clare.

"Gran won't like any Ban-the-Bomb movement," Miranda said.

"She'll say the atom bomb won the war for us in ten minutes ... The
Prime Minister doesn't need to be told how to run the country by
ignorant ungrateful rabble rousers ... You know what Gran will say,
Clare."

"CND is perfectly respectable," Clare said defensively.

"Bertrand Russell and six other Nobel prizewinners support banning the
atomic bomb, and Albert Einstein did too.  In any future war, nuclear
weapons might wipe out this whole planet."

"Gran still won't like it," Miranda warned.

"I cannot stand deceit!"  Elinor croaked as she waved a letter at
Clare the following morning: she lay in the sunny opulence of her
bedroom nursing an attack of bronchitis.

To avoid her grandmother's eye, Clare looked around the pretty room.
The walls were cream, the curtains buttercup, to match the brocade
hangings of the four-poster bed.  Upon the faded yellows of the
Bessarabian rug stood a Regency sofa with tiger-skin cushions.  Piles
of books and fragrant pots of narcissi filled the room.

"Kindly look at me, Clare."  Elinor sneezed.

"I'm waiting to hear what you have to say for yourself," she added
crossly as she gazed at Clare, who stood before her in a pink sweater
and tweed skirt, a furtive expression on her face.

Again Elinor wondered anxiously whether Clare had a lover: this was
what all the mothers worried about, although none of the debutantes
more innocent than their mothers realized ever knew it.  She wondered
if the man was married, if he made some business excuse to his wife on
Tuesday and Thursday evenings, when Clare was clearly not doing what
she said she was doing.

I'll have to lie again, Clare thought miserably.  She remembered being
puzzled as a child because grown-ups taught children not to lie, but
then they looked you in the eye and lied about where babies came from.
So from adults, Clare learned to tell 'fibs" to avoid hurting people's
feelings, to protect somebody else, or to avoid adult wrath.

"I'm waiting," wheezed Elinor, furious.  She sneezed again, and one of
her letters slid to the floor.  Clare could see the Swithin, Timmins
and Grant address flowing across the top of the page.

Looking away again, Clare said without thinking, "I was with Adam
Grant."  Twice a week?  And always home by ten?  Exactly what were you
doing with Ada mT e was teaching me to play bridge.  I want to be
really Well, that's easy enough to check."  Elinor reached for the
cream telephone.

Clare, never a facile liar, felt helpless.

"Good morning, Adam.  Have you seen Clare recently?"  Clare's heart
sank. She had hoped that Adam might not be in his office.  0 n il to u
understand why you can't give me a straight answer," Eli nor said, "but
you may talk to her if you wish."  She motioned to Clare to pick up the
telephone.

Adam's voice in Clare's ear said: "Listen, Clare, I can't he to my
client.  If you're in trouble, I'll try to help you, but tell me the
truth or I can't help ... Are you seeing some man secretly?  ... No?
Good!  Are you doing anything illegal?  ... No?  Then tell Elinor where
you've been!  Tell her straight away.  Whatever you've been concealing
from her can't be nearly as bad as her fears, so you may be forgiven
immediately.  And next week, I will take you out to dinner so that will
be something to look forward to."  Clare replaced the receiver and, in
a low voice, said to Elinor, "I go to night school."

"Night school!  But that's for people who haven't ..2 Elinor,
remembering the impoverished students at her polytechnic classes, was
puzzled.  She said, "You've had a good education, Clare."

"I don't think so.  I didn't learn much at Hazlehurst Park.  I only got
two 0 levels before you whisked me off to that stupid finishing
school."

"What ingratitude!  No man wants a bluestocking for a wife a man wants
someone who will grace his drawing room, in a ladylike manner."

"I don't intend to sit in a drawing room for the rest of my life! We're
living in the twentieth century, not in the old days at Larkwood!" 
All three sisters knew that Elinor still smarted from the hurt feelings
of inferiority inflicted upon her by Billy's family. Clare added, "I
want to do something useful with my LIFE!"

"Aren't wives useful?  Aren't mothers useful?"  "There can be more to
life than being a wife and mother!"

"Well, what exactly are you studying to make you more useful?"
"Sociology," Clare said defiantly.

Elinor looked astonished and alarmed.

"My dear child, surely you're not going to be a social worker?"  "I
don't see why I shouldn't be," Clare replied defensively.

"It's a very useful job."

"Of course it is.  That's all very well for other people.  But not you,
Clare.  Not traipsing around slums."

""y not?  Gran, what have you got against sociology?."  Elinor
sighed.

"What exactly is sociology?"

"It tells you how society developed and how it functions or doesn't
function sometimes," Clare said.

"But, darling, your studies at school never reached the level required
for these subjects, so .. ."  "Exactly!  I'll also be studying
anthropology, psychology, and philosophy."

"Surely not in only two evenings a week?"

"Since you now know about it, I'd like to be a full-time student.  If I
have enough basic qualifications.  And if not, I'd like to get them."

"To what purpose, dear child?  Nice men don't want to marry a
sociologist or a philosopher.  Why can't you study something less
highbrow and a bit mare useful?  How about a cookery course at the
Cordon Bleu school?  It's always an asset to know how to plan menus."

"Gran, can't you understand that I'm interested in the world beyond my
kitchen?"  Clare spluttered angrily.

"Of course you are.  You're an intelligent young woman and you must
follow what the men are talking about."  want the men to follow what
I'm talking about will "never again be cocktail party chitchat!"  Clare
shoutea.  ow can you say that tome?"  ran, I don't understand why I
can't!  Why do I have to be furtive?  Why don't you understand what I
want to do, and why"

"But sociology ... how will that help you?"  I'm interested in helping
other people.  Every4 see li I look, I inequa ty."  philosophy ...
isn't that flying a bit high?  And has philosophy got to do with slum
child renT "Philosophy is concerned with ideas, and ideas are what
democracy is based on," Clare said, exasperated.

"I don't understand how the world got into this state, but I'm going to
try to find out and then do something about it."

"One young woman can't do anything to right the wrongs of the world,"
Elinor said, equally exasperated.

"I'll never do anything if I don't try."  Clare was wearing her
stubborn look.

"Why can't you leave such things to politicians, who've been trained to
do their job?"  Elinor cried.

"Your generation is going to be the last one to have blind faith in
politicians!"

"My generation seemed to manage without your intellectual pretensions,"
Elinor said acidly.

"Your generation was the one that got us into the Second World War!"

TUESDAY, 18 DECEMBER 1956 As she handed her green satin cloak to the
butler, Clare once again felt the butterflies rise in her stomach the
wish-l-could-turn-around-and-run-out-of-here feeling that she always
experienced when she arrived at a party.  Everyone else seemed so
self-assured.  When she know nobody, Clare liked to slink to the
cloakroom as fast as possible and stay there as long as possible,
before facing a throng of people who all seemed to know each other.

Tonight Clare felt doubly nervous, because Adam had taken her, for the
first time, to one of the illegal gambling games that were fast
becoming fashionable in London.  These parties were always held after
dinner, from ten o'clock to dawn; no charge was made for the abundant
and delicious food and drink, or the traditional English breakfast of
bacon and eggs, sausages, kidneys, and kedgeree that was served from
two a.m.

Clare knew that tonight's party had been organized by Michael Grant.
Good-looking, presentable, an old Etonian and ex-Guards officer
although only national service, he was the perfect sort of person to
organize a chic but illegal game.

All invitations were issued on the telephone nothing was ever put on
paper to people who had plenty of money and enjoyed a little naughty
excitement and glamour.  It was reminiscent of America during
Prohibition.

Merely to know the venue meant one was chic; no one considered the
danger.  Michael Grant's guests had been brought up to consider the
police as people who got you out of trouble, not into trouble. Besides,
the possibility of a police raid added to the thrill, and to be caught
on such a raid was considered proof of sophistication and daring.

For the fashionable young people who flocked to the gambling parties,
there was also the added thrill of rubbing shoulders with genuine
criminals, whom they were unlikely to encounter in any other way. Tough
bouncers were hired to protect the organizer; they saw that no drunk
tore the place apart, and that losers paid up promptly.  The protective
services were paid for with a cut of the house take, and one of the mob
was always present in order to check on it.  Thus, rich young society
gamblers were now on first-name with some of the toughest hoods in
London's East "End; this, too, was considered chic.  As Clare and Adam
walked into a well-furnished Belgravia drawing room, Michael Grant
stepped forward.

"Here you are at last!  We've got an interesting crowd tonight nearly
all the Eton gambling mafia's here ..."  Michael looked at Clare as her
eyes played around the roomful of people in evening dress talking
quietly over drinks."  This is Clare O'Dare?"

It had been almost four years since their holiday in St Tropez  No
longer small and skinny, Clare was now gracefully slim, pale, and
elusive, with the flashing blue-eyed stare and enigmatic allure of a
mermaid.  Tonight her fey quality was emphasized by a blue-green
chiffon gown.

Clare said shyly, "You look exactly the same, Mike but you seem somehow
... different."  She sensed recklessness in this wide-shouldered,
well-groomed man in the beautifully cut dinner jacket; and Mike's slow
smile did not contradict a feeling of menace.  Clare felt uneasy with
him, whereas she felt completely safe with Adam.

Adam rourmured something to his brother that Clare couldn't hear; they
seemed to be very close, she thought, as they laughed together.  Adam
looked around the room and laughed again.

"It looks as if you've lived here for years, Mike!"

In order to avoid the police, these illegal games took place at a
different address each night.  Mike persuaded socially acceptable
people, for a huge fee, to rent out their London home for twenty-four
hours; sometimes this was done by a son or daughter while the unknowing
parents were abroad or in the country.  On the morning following a
party, the furniture removal van that Mike kept permanently employed
would arrive to shift the furniture, china, linen, and cutlery to the
next house.  Mike always used the same firm of first-class,
professional caterers, the normal Sj,vaA0,-of the house not being
considered trustworthy on these occasions.

"Let's get some champagne and go into the back rooms, where they're
playing roulette and chem my suggested Adam, not present for pleasure
only.

Mike had asked Adam to look around, because Mike's game was straight
and he wanted to keep it so.  A few games had been quietly taken over
by their 'protectors', after which the games were crooked.  East End
thugs were astonished at the idea of running a straight game.  Of
course you let the punter win a bit at first, in order to encourage
him, but after that naturally, the house won.  You were in business to
make money.  And if, by chance, a punter had a big win, he was
generally relieved of his winnings on the way to his car, and nobody
could prove that the mugging was connected.  However, this was rarely
necessary, since the punter usually lost it was the law of nature.

Mike reckoned that, should anyone try to put pressure on him, Adam
would know someone to apply a little firm counterpressure.

Adam now worked full-time for the family firm; he had taken his
solicitors" finals the previous year and was now fully conversant with
trust accounts and bookkeeping, papers and property law, conveyancing
and the law of contracts.  At night, whenever possible, he gambled.

By one o'clock in the morning Clare was tired and ready to go home, but
Adam was still playing roulette.  Again he offered Clare fifty pounds
with which to gamble but she shook her head.

"Take money from a man?  Gran would throw me into the snow and cut me
off without a shilling."

"Rubbish.  She's mad about all of you.  Youll never be cut off without
a shilling.  She may lose her temper from time to time, but Elinor's
bark is far worse than her bite.  Look how your row ended she's agreed
that you can go to a crammer and study."  "I won't be able.  to study
anything tomorrow unless you me home soon."

"Just one more throw," Adam promised.  Clare yawned as she watched Adam
swiftly place his stake.  She felt too tired and shy to speak to anyone
else, and anyway, the people in this quiet room were intent only on
gambling.

Above the rattling clunk of the ball, Clare heard a faint commotion
from the hall.

Adam's head jerked up.  Ignoring his winnings, he took Clare by the arm
in a grip that was hard enough to bruise.

"That sounds like a police raid.  Follow me quickly."

"But, Adam ... my cloak

Adam had hustled Clare out of the rear door while other guests were
still looking puzzled.

"Ow, Adam, you're hurting me," Clare cried, but Adam took no notice. He
opened a door at the back of the hall and pushed her down the stone
stairs to the basement.  She nearly collided with a waiter, who was
carrying champagne up from the kitchen below.

Once at the bottom of the stairs, Clare could hear hammering against
the front basement door, around which scared kitchen staff had
gathered.

"Better let 'em in, Ernie," she heard someone say as Adam dragged her
out of the back door and into the dark garden.

"There should be a ladder to your right," Adam whispered.

"Get up it and wait on top of the garden wall."

"But I can't ... my dresW In the dark, Adam grabbed Clare's chiffon
skirts, pulled them up to her waist, and threw them over her
shoulders.

"The ladder's right in front of you, Clare!  Climb itf Clare pulled off
her silver slipper she'd lost the other on the stairs and slowly
climbed the workman's ladder, which wobbled each time she cautiously
moved her foot up a rung into the darkness.

"Got a move on!"  Adam whispered urgently.

"I can hear the police in the kitchen!"

Tentatively Clare groped with her left hand, feeling for the wall, but
pawed only air.

"Hurry!  " She moved up two more rungs and again stretched her hand
upward, but still felt nothing.  This wall was as high as the Great
Wall of China!

Again Clare reached out her hand, and this time touched the damp,
uneven, unyielding bricks.  Below her, she felt the ladder tremble as
Adam started to climb.  Clare thought she preferred to be caught by the
police, rather than break her neck falling from a ladder in the dark.

After she climbed the next rung, Clare's hands groped forward, but she
grasped empty air.  Clearly she was now at the top of the wall and
would have to get off the ladder.

As she crouched atop the wall, she heard windows thrown open with a
crash.  Someone shouted, "Send two men into the garden!"

Adam nimbly scrambled up beside her.  No time to pull the ladder up so
we-can climb down the other side, Adam thought, and pushed the ladder
backwards.  Before it hit the ground, he had jumped into the dark
safety of the neighbouring garden.

"I'm in a flower bed," he whispered up to Clare.

"You'll have to risk it.  I can't see to catch you.  For God's sake
jump!, Clare clung to the top of the wall, too frightened to jump.

"What about MikeTshe whispered anxiously.

Adam hesitated a moment, as he thought of the many occasions when Mike
had loyally shouldered the blame for his adored elder brother.  Adam
fleetingly remembered the biweekly ceremony of stealing chocolate from
the local sweetshop counter, where, eventually, the police had been
"ought in by the irate shopkeeper and were waiting for the two
schoolboy thieves; Mike confessed although Adam had been the ringleader
and Mike refused to name the other schoolboy conspirator, for which
bravery he was soundly whipped by his father.  Adam also remembered the
ringing-doorbells-and-x-unning-away episodes when Adam', the ringleader
and the faster runner, had always managed to hide in someone's garden
or up an alley, where he listened heart pounding to Mike's capture,
knowing that a thundering row with their father would follow, and that
Mike, after loyally swearing that Adam had nothing to do with it, would
be beaten and punished.

Through childhood and adolescence, there had been many similar
instances and never once had Adam confessed to having taken part in
them.  He had become used to this useful fraternal hero-worship.  So
now, in the earthy, damp darkness, he shrugged his shoulders and
-whispered to Clare, "Mike won't mind, he never does.  Now, for God's
sake jump!"

The back door behind Clare opened with a crash.  She jumped downward,
into the dark, into Adam's arms.

Before she had caught her breath, he grabbed her right.  wrist.

"Let's get to the back door.  It should be open."  As quickly as he
could, Adam groped his way along the garden wall towards the silent
house, shoving shrubs aside as he did so.

Eventually the garden wall ended and his fingertips moved to the left:
they touched ... a window ... more brick wall ... and then a panelled
door.  He felt for the handle, gently turned it to the left, and
pushed.

The door opened.  Adam yanked Clare into the house; then slowly and
very quietly he shut the door.  His fingertips found the key in the
lock, and he turned it carefully to the right.  Swiftly

AN

AAk he pushed upward, until he found the bolt and rammed it home.

"Adam, we've just broken into someone's house!"  Clare whispered.

"Mike always plans an escape route for himself."

"But you pushed the ladder away, so Mike couldn't use it!"  Your
grandmother wouldn't like anything to happen to you."  "What do we do
now?"  "We sit here until morning.  Then we'll borrow a couple of coats
and simply walk out of the front door and past the police."

Adam draped his jacket around Clare's shoulders.  They both sat on the
stone-paved floor of what seemed to be an old scullery, leading off a
kitchen.

In the dark, Clare shivered as much from excitement as from cold.  The
voluptuous gambling party represented the kind of decadence that she
had always considered waste, but it had been exciting to feel decadent,
and wickedly sophisticated, just for a few hours.  After that evening,
Clare always felt protected when she was with Adam.  It never occurred
to her that, had Adam not taken her to an illegal game, there would
have been no need to rescue her from it.

CHAPTER 9

THURSDAY, 17 APRIL 1958

11 don't suppose you deserve breakfast in bed," Buzz said as she
carried a tray into Annabel's frilled pink bedroom.

"How many hearts did you break last night?"  "Owl  Buzz, darling Buzz,
please don't pull back the curtains.  Owl That sunshine is blinding."

"It's nearly midday."  Buzz cruelly drew the curtains farther apart,
and looked down to see Elinor picking anemones beneath the white and
pink blossoming trees of the orchard.

Eighteen-year-old Annabel sat up and stretched.  She looked older than
her age, Buzz thought.  Beneath that tangle of tawny hair, Annabel was
the sister who most resembled the young Elinor; she had the same steady
gaze and full, moist mouth with a natural curve, so that she seemed
always to be smiling slightly, even when asleep.

The difference between Annabel's debut and Clare's had been that
Annabel loved every minute of it.  Lady Rushleigk had again been very
helpful, and Elinor had not only paid her expenses for the London
season but had also given her a sunburst diamond brooch she had admired
when Elinor wore it.

Lady Rushleigh's prot6g6e had met with great success.

Beautiful, indolent Annabel was always surrounded by men; flirtation
seemed natural to her, she was as gently provocative to the postman and
the butcher's boy on his bicycle as she was to the more eligible young
men with whom she danced.  Lighthearted, gay, and frivolous, Annabel
did not restrict her encounters with these gentlemen to the dance
floor: there had been much furtive groping on ballroom balconies, in
taxis, and, early in the morning, in the cold and darkened drawing room
of Elinor's London flat.

Annabel was wildly excited by the eroticism of the forbidden as well as
by the turbulent hormones that coursed through her body.  No matter how
tired she felt when she left a party, she was always re-energized by
the feel of a man's arm around her waist, a man's hard, warm palm on
her naked shoulder as he pushed straps aside and explored the soft
flesh of her breasts: Annabel felt a swooning, delirious tug from the
bottom of her stomach as she murmured, "You mustn't ... you really
mustn't..  ."  Trembling from these touches, Annabel would sometimes
allow what, earlier in the evening, she had decided on no account to
permit; and a man's hand would slide beneath the net or taffeta skirt
to her smooth, nylon covered knee, eventually to move stealthily over
the stocking top, over a taut satin suspender, and slip inward over
Annabel's soft, quivering thigh.  The young man was then pushed off
into the night, tumescent, throbbing, painfully frustrated.

"Time you was up and packing," Buzz said, turning again to the
window.

Elinor, in the orchard, looked up, saw Buzz at Annabel's window, and
waved.  In her gardening clothes, she did not look the glittering,
glamorous legend that she had become since Billy's death.  Buzz had
been astonished by the change in her personality: Nell had blossomed;
she had clearly become a person in her own right as well as a soaring
success in the world.

Her American publisher now wished her to meet her readers on the other
side of the Atlantic, so Elinor, accompanied by Annabel, was about to
fly to New York, the first city on her US tour.

Annabel yawned.

"Buzz, has anyone taken breakfast to Hare Buzz sniffed, placed the tray
before Annabel, and chopped off the top of Annabel's boiled egg with an
unnecessary violence that clearly showed her opinion of Harry" You
don't want to bother too much about him," Buzz said.

"There'll be tears before bedtime over that young n3asher."

"I don't understand why you dislike him, Buzz.  You've hardly met him,"
Annabel protested.  Buzz had lectured her incessantly about the
pitfalls of love.

Buzz poured herself a cup of coffee and sat on the end of the bed.

"Seen his type before: Don Juan."  Buzz pronounced thej, as in jab

"Harry don't love you, my girl Harry don't love anyone.  Pays the girls
a lot of attention, o'course, but so does a hunter stalking deer.  I
bet Harry rushes from one girl to the next, just to show himself he
can."  She wrinkled her forehead.

"I ain't never fathomed why a man who gets through a lot of women is
reckoned to be some sort of hero, while a woman who has a lot of fellas
is called a nymphomaniac."

Annabel said, "And how do you know so much about.  men, Buzz?"

Buzz hesitated.  She still felt mild astonishment that Ginger Higby
had, long ago, so clearly preferred her to all other women.  She still
kept all his letters, and his mother showing great kindness had given
her two photographs of Ginger as a child.  Buzz was comforted by the
big buff envelope that contained these remnants of all the sexual love
she would ever know.

The feelings that Ginger's body had aroused in her had, after his
death, led Buzz to touch herself experimentally, hoping to remember
those past moments of thwarted passion.  To her astonishment, she
discovered the erotic Ii climax, which should have been the
culmination of her always abruptly severed lovemaking with Ginger.
Because she alone was responsible for her pleasure, Buzz felt guilty,
felt disloyal to Ginger.  She knew instinctively that this was a
forbidden game.  But why, she asked herself defensively, should she not
experience those physical feelings she had been denied by some unknown
soldier who would never know if he still existed that an accidental
squeeze of his finger had caused an eternal void in Buzz's life, which
had not seemed empty before she met Ginger.

Looking at beautiful Annabel, able to have any fellow she fancied, Buzz
sighed and said, "I know about rascals like Harry because I've got
eyes, miss, and I've been using them for years.  The Harrys don't
bother about an old stick like me they don't notice I'm watching 'em."
Harry reminded Buzz of Billy.

The door was flung open and seventeen-year-old Miranda made her
entrance; she wore Stuart tartan slacks and a black sweater; her thick,
shoulder-length hair was the brilliant orange of marmalade.

"Like it?  As Miranda twisted her head from side to side, the flaming
hair swung outward.

"John French.  Cost a fortune four guineas."  Annabel was impressed.

"Gran'll kill you.".

"Theatrical," Buzz sniffed.

"You'd better wash it off before she sees you."

"Can't.  It's dyed."  Miranda was triumphant.

"She'll definitely kill you," Annabel said respectfully.

"Dyed hair is unladylike."  Miranda was defiant.

"Gran's fifty-eight years old, hasn't got a single grey hair, and is as
blonde as Marilyn Monroe.  Gran goes to John French."  Clare pushed
open the door.

"So this is where everyone is.  What are you talking about?"  "Love."
Annabel stretched happily.

"Love that makes you as if you're high in the clouds, with masses of
energy no need for sleep."  Remembering, Buzz nodded.

"No wonder women long for it.  Gives 'em.  something exciting to think
about while they're doing the dull things that women do which is where
your gran comes in."

"Gran" Annabel exclaimed through a mouthful of buttered toast.

"How?"  I When a woman reads about some xciting man in a novel, she
forgets she ain't got a man, or she ain't got the right sort of man.
She falls a little bit in love with the hero, and although he don't
exist, her feelings about him exist, all right.  She really feels a bit
excited."

"That's the whole point of escapist literature," Clare said tartly.

"You can pretend you're really living it."  Buzz nodded again.

"Some women get hooked, like a drug, on romance and they'd rather have
it out of a book than not at all ... the sort of woman that feels
hopeful before a party, wonders if her Prince Charming will appear, is
disappointed when he don't, and goes home feeling a failure."

"I don't want to marry Prince Charming," Clare said firmly.

"Just an honest ... trustworthy ... supportive ... sensitive ...
man."

"That doesn't sound very exciting."  Annabel licked her buttery
fingers.

"I want one that's strong ... fascinating ... dynamic and a bit
mysterious."

"I want a man of action," Miranda said.

" A romantic looking leader of men, like Rupert of the Rhine."

"Titled?  Rich?  Powerful?"  Buzz queried.

"Good-looking, tall, blue-eyed?"  "Blue eyes aren't absolutely
necessary, "Annabel conceded.

Buzz said sourly, "And this almost perfect man that you all want if he
exists what exactly are you each offering him?  Similar perfection?"
'oh Buzz, we were having a nice sexy talk and you've turned it into a
lecture again."  Annabel yawned.

"I'm trying to knock a bit of sense into your head before exciting Mr.
Heartbreaker Harry wakes up."  Buzz reached for the tray.

"There ain't no perfect men, and exciting men make women miserable."
Again she thought of Billy.

MONDAY, 21 APRIL 1958

In spite of the air freshener, the windowless greenroom of the New York
TV news station still smelled of dead cigarettes and stale coffee.

A girl dressed casually with an oversized man's shirt over her skirt
opened the door and beckoned to Elinor, who stood up feeling terrified
but looking calm and self possessed  She wore a Christian Dior apricot
silk dress and duster coat, suitable for any formal day or evening
occasion that didn't call for an ankle-length dress.  Her blonde hair
was in a chignon.  Careful dieting had kept her weight what it had been
when she was seventeen; neat cosmetic surgery around her eyelids and
chin had left only a few faint lines at the sides of her mouth to
indicate her age.

"Good luck," whispered the publisher's press agent.

"Knock 'em dead," encouraged Annabel, who wore heavy make-up and a
silver, sleeveless sheath from Bazaar.

In the studio, the charismatic fair-haired young interviewer introduced
Elinor as this year's winner of the International Romance Writers Award
and then, predictably, asked the secret of her success.

Elinor beamed.

"The secret of writing good romantic fiction is to feel romantic, look
romantic, and be romantic."  "Some people describe your books as trash.
What do you feel about th at?"

The publisher's press agent had warned Elinor that Scott Svenson would
listen to her every word, remember her 18o ovary word and not hesitate
to use it against her; he never Vve anyone an easy ride, but he was the
station's best interviewer.  Elinor continued to beam.

"Millions of my readers wouldn't agree.  Today's classics were
sometimes described in the past as trash Charles Dickens's books were
serialized in popular magazines, and Thomas Hardy's work was called
pulp fiction.  Even Shakespeare a very commercial writer was accused by
his contemporaries of writing potboilers."

"And what is your formula for a potboiler?"  "The ingredients of a good
novel are as basic and simple as the ingredients of a souft" Elinor
said with a smile.

"Good characterization, a believable, well-constructed plot, detailed
research, and dialogue that's easy to read.  I keep to the point, write
short paragraphs, ration my adjectives, and try never to use
superfluous words."

"Your sex scenes have been described as "limp".  Would you agree?"

"My books contain love scenes, but never a sex scene.  I see no need to
follow my heroines to the marriage bed: we all know what happens
there."

"You have been accused of lack of realism in this respect."

"Realism is the last thing my readers want: they get enough of that at
home.  My books provide a holiday from reality... She was a tough old
bird, Scott thought.  How could he shake that smile?  He tried again.

"Although you live in a world of romance, you have never remarried. Why
is there no man in your life?"  Elinor still smiled.

"There will be a man in my life when I choose to have a man in my
life," she said, "just as the heroine of my new novel, Heartbreak in
Jamaica .. ."  After all, the point of being on this show was to
publicize her book.

Annabel and her grandmother came out of the greenroom just as the
interviewer was coming through the stage door.

Scott stopped.

"Hi."  He threw them the careless, boyish gtnile that made thousands of
women stop their husband from switching channels.

"I'd like to say how great you were, Miss Dove," Scott said
respectfully.

"Is this your daughter?"  Maybe he was piling it on too thick?  "I
wondered if ... The Plaza's just around the corner, if you'd care for a
drink?"

"Thank you, but we are tired after our trip."  Elinor swept out.  She
had felt under slight but unyielding pressure during the entire
interview.

Annabel lingered, unwilling to be dragged to bed on her first night in
New York.

"Why don't you come to our suite for a drink?"  she suggested.  They
were, in fact, staying at the Plaza.

By the time they reached her hotel suite, Elinor had heard that she
possessed a natural screen presence, although Scott would like to
suggest one or two little professional tricks.  He added, "As a matter
of fact, I could tell you were from the Midwest.  It wasn't only your
accent, it was your forthright, no-nonsense attitude."  Elinor gave a
genuine smile.

"I could tell straight away that you were.  I knew I couldn't pull the
wool over your eyes., By the time the champagne bottle was empty,
Elinor had thoroughly interviewed Scott, to his amusement.

Scott came from Cleveland, Ohio, where he'd started to write for his
high-school paper in his senior year, then studied communications at
college.  He worked as a junior assistant on a local Cleveland paper
no, unfortunately, not the Plain Dealer and eventually slid into the
foreign editor's office as a freelance researcher.  At that point, a
locally owned and operated TV station wanted a cheap, fast, non
complaining researcher-writer, and as the job paid twice as much as the
newspaper, Scott took it.  Gradually he was allowed to cover minor
stories.

tt did not mention that his boyish good looks and smile had earned him
the malicious nickname of tty Boy'.  He had been lucky that he first
appeared on the box when stations were out to woo the youth audience
and all newscasters over the age of thirty-five were secretly having
their eye bags removed.  With just enough training and experience,
Scott had turned up at the right time, but not quite in the right
place.  A year later, he applied for the job of news reporter on a
local TV station in New York City.  Once hired, he surprised the
director of news by his hard nosed carefully researched stories and
hard-hitting interviews: recently he had been allowed to appear as a
relief newscaster and interviewer.

By midnight, Elinor was asleep in her bed, but Scott and Annabel having
promised not to return too late were drinking more champagne at '21'.

An hour later, they creaked around Central Park in one of the romantic
horse-drawn black cabs that wait dolefully outside the Plaza.  Scott
gently kissed Annabel's nose and tried to think' of ways to keep her in
New York.

Then the obvious idea hit him.

"Why don't you try model fine  he murmured in her ear.

"I can fix you an interview with the best agent in town."

"All the girls I know want to be air hostesses or models," Annabel
said.

"But I'm not sure Gran would let me."

"Then don't ask her."  On the following morning, Annabel sat opposite a
well groomed blonde, aged forty plus, in a beige gabardine suit.  The
wall behind her desk was covered by citations.  Scott had briefed her
on Bates Model Agency run by a husband-and-wife team, Moses and Jenny
Bates.  Ten years before, they had borrowed a thousand dollars to set
up their company; within three years, they had a stable of thirty-nine
models and total billings of three hundred thousand dollars.  Mrs.
Bates chose and supervised the models; her husband was responsible for
their bookings.  They discovered that marketing the most beautiful
women in the world was not very difficult, but finding them was a
problem.

Each year, the Bateses saw and rejected about five thousand applicants;
they held talent contests all over America and also overseas for blonde
models were the most popular, and the best were to be found in Germany
and Scandinavia.  The cosmetics industry was especially willing to -pay
very high fees for an exquisite new face; while complaining about the
Bateses" high charges, cosmetics companies continued to pay them
because there was no cheaper way to find girls of the high standard of
beauty, charm, grooming, and professional behaviour punctuality,
patience, and amiability so carefully set by the Bateses.

"Don't pluck her eyebrows yet, just tidy them up we'll see how they
photograph," ordered Mrs.  Bates.  She tapped her pencil against her
teeth and scrutinized Annabel's face once more.

"Go and wash your face in the dressing room.  I need to see you without
make-up."  When Annabel returned, Mrs.  Bates squinted at her, then
nodded briefly.

"We'll fix a few test shots.  Janey here win arrange them for this
afternoon."  When she saw Annabel's test shots, Mrs.  Bates smiled and
called her for a second interview.

Jenny Bates leaned forward across her white desk.

"Don't think a model's job is easy or glamorous.  Less than one per
cent of beginner models are immediately successful, and When they are,
it's rarely because of their beauty but because for some odd reason
they catch the eye of an advertising agency as being "different" and
"right for now"."  As with newscasters, a girl who was the toast of the
for one period would automatically not look for the next.  -"And if
she's to stand out from the rest," Mrs.  Bates added, "a girl needs
some extra, unique quality that the other models don't possess."  The
model's face also needed enough-sensual appeal to attract a man, but
not so much -that it would make a woman feel threatened.  Have you
heard of Suzy Parker?"  Mrs.  Bates asked.

Annabel nodded.  Who had not?  Redheaded Suzy Parker "and her brunette
sister, Dorian Leigh, had been the top models of the fifties: they both
possessed classic beauty, an exquisite sophistication, and dazzling
'glamour" the cosmetics industry's euphemism for sex appeal.  Now they
were past their professional peak; in a blaze of publicity, Dorian 'had
opened a model agency in Paris and Suzy had signed a film contract. The
top seats were vacant.

Jenny Bates, looking over the flowers on her desk, wondered whether
Annabel might fill that vacancy.  She had beauty, feminine charm, and
that unmistakable, uncopyable old-money look; her sleepy aquamarine
eyes were most unusual, as was the large mouth that should have looked
too big for her tiny face but didn't.  While kitten faces were
currently fashionable Leslie Caron, Audrey Hepburn, Brigitte Bardot,
Annabel's face was more like that of a wild mountain cat.

"Stand 'up once more, and walk to the door, please," ordered Mrs.
Bates.  She watched Annabel closely.  This girl was not glamorous,
groomed, or sophisticated; she didn't even shave her legs.  She must be
tidied up immediately, but without losing that just-tumbled-out-of-bed
took.

And then she might prove right for Avanti.  Avand was looking for a
face to work exclusively for them; they were also willing to pay the
face to do nothing when they didn't need her, rather than be used by a
rival.  Avanti had asked for a classic Scandinavian blonde because all
cosmetics companies believed that a blonde could sell anything to
anyone.  Annabel was not such a blonde, but golden highlights would
probably do the trick.

Avanti had pulled itself into a position where it almost rivalled
Revlon: they hoped that their next ambitious promotion would rival
Revlon's "Fire and Ice" campaign of 1952, regarded by the trade as
unbeatable.  Featuring Dorian Leigh in a tight-fitting sheath of silver
sequins and a flowing crimson cape, it had combined elegance, class,
and sensuality; it suggested that beneath the ordinary woman lay
another woman a smouldering temptress.

Avanti's shorthand specification for the girl they were seeking to
rival the Fire and Ice girl was 'a class act and a tiger in the sack'.
The creative director had specified: 'young but not too young, a
graceful and sophisticated international woman', lively but not noisy,
glamorous but approachable, sporty but not sweaty, and equally at home
in town and country.

And the final requisite would be no problem, for Annabel clearly came
from a respectable background: the morality clause included in her
contract would stipulate that, should she be or have been involved in a
scandal, which might adversely affect the Avanti promotion, the
contract would immediately be terminated.

Annabel had better spend tomorrow at the hairdresser, Mrs.  Bates
decided, first for highlights, then to try different hairstyles.  For
her interviews, Annabel would need more sophisticated clothes than this
butter-coloured shirt waister  After the hairdresser, she'd better take
her to Bergdorf.

Jenny Bates, wondering whether, at last, she had found a contender for
the number one slot, said, "Do you really have to leave for Chicago
tomorrow?"  NESDAY, 2j APRIL 1958 V,.

must have been something I ate last night maybe those oysters," groaned
Annabel, who had carefully chosen oysters.  She knew that only a
supervised and non-toowrious illness would persuade Elinor, who could
not easily cancel her tour, to leave her granddaughter alone in New
York.

The hotel doctor was puzzled.

"I can't find anything wrong with her, but you say she vomited and
suffered from diarrhoea during the night, so she's clearly not well,"
he said.

"She shouldn't travel yet.  Better leave her here under observation
she'll be perfectly safe at the Plaza.  I'll visit her every day and
keep you informed of her condition."

The publisher's press agent shot him a look of gratitude and relief.
She didn't want Elinor to miss the Chicago plane.

"But I can't leave a child alone in New York!"  Elinor said,
"especially if she's ill."  Nevertheless, she hesitated, knowing how
carefully her publisher had planned this expensive tour, and how long
it had taken to organize.

There's clearly nothing seriously wrong with your granddaughter," the
hotel doctor reassured her.

"It'll probably clear up in a couple of days."

"No, I can't leave Annabel alone," Elinor decided.

"But all the dinners, and the signings ... You can't disappoint all
those people who are looking forward to meeting you," the publisher's
agent pleaded.

Elinor shook her head.

"I'm sorry."

"Couldn't you ask Buzz to fly overT Annabel asked.

"Although I'll probably have joined you in Chicago by the time she
arrives."  Elinor considered.

"That might be the answer She went to the phone.

A startled Buzz agreed to get to New York as fast as possible, and then
insisted on speaking to Annabel about her symptoms.

"A touch of colic," she decided.

"Now you be a good girl and stay in bed with a hot-water bottle until I
get there."

"Oh, I will," Annabel promised, feeling increasingly guilty.

Annabel stayed in bed until after the plane's departure.  Then she
threw back her bedclothes, tore off her nightgown, and danced like a
whirling dervish in the middle of the room.  She was free!  She was
alone in New York!  Alone at the Plaza!  She rushed to the window and
looked down on the green treetops of Central Park; to her right, beyond
the line of listless horse cabs, a fountain sparkled in the sun. Behind
it lay the excitement of Fifth Avenue, and somewhere behind that was
the Bates Model Agency, where her future her life perhaps would be
decided ... Jenny Bates had no idea that Annabel had faked illness to
stay in New York.  She knew that Annabel had no cash, although she
could order anything she wanted at the Plaza; it was the same with all
the British, who had to budget on a ludicrously low,
government-regulated travel allowance and rely on friends to finance
them.

Later that morning, Mrs.  Bates took Annabel across the street from the
Plaza to Bergdorf Goodman: Bates Model Agency paid for her new clothes,
in advance of fees due.

At lunchtime, Annabel telephoned Buzz, hoping it wasn't too late to
tell her not to buy her ticket to New York yet: Annabel's 'colic" was
much better and tomorrow she might be well enough to join Elinor in
Chicago.

"Thank heaven for that," said Buzz.

"You haven't half given us a fright.  I wasn't able to get a seat until
the morning ... Keep well wrapped up, and do as the doctor tells
you."

"I will," Annabel promised her, and skipped off to Saks.

On the following morning, after another glorious shopping spree,
Annabel walked in spring sunshine down Fifth Arden, where a crimson
door of Elizabeth ion had been booked for her.  Five hours y groomed
Annabel emerged with a persona lid make-up chart, false eyelashes, and
false nails.  Her hair had been trimmed, streaked blonde, and restyled.
Roboto had designed a wig and two hairpieces for her one a chignon, but
these would take three weeks to complete.

She rushed back to the Plaza to telephone Buzz before her bedtime, and
reported that she now felt fit enough to join Elinor.

"That's good news," said Buzz.

"Wish I could speak to Nell myself, but it takes hours to get through.
The Warminster telephone operator makes enough fuss about booking a
call to London, let alone New York!"

"I'll give Gran your love," Annabel told her, and dashed off to
Bloomingdale's.

That evening, Annabel also used maybe-tomorrow tactics when Elinor
telephoned.  Considering that mothers have been daughters, Annabel
thought, as she waited for Scott to finish his broadcast, it's
surprisingly easy for a young girl to deceive them.  I Early the next
day, Annabel returned to Elizabeth Arden's pink gymnasium for a
personal head-to-toe reshaping course, during which her exercise expert
found body exercises for muscles that Annabel never knew she had.  She
also had her posture corrected; she was taught to lift her rib cage and
'box" her stomach and rear with her hands, as ballet dancers do before
dancing, and also to walk as if she were lightly holding a coin between
her buttocks.

"I never realized that being beautiful is a full-time busines," Annabel
told Scott that evening as they sipped martinis in the Plaza bar.

Scott looked at her with bemused surprise: in four days, Annabel seemed
to have changed into a taller, paradoxically 18q wwldr,but- sleeker
version of herself.  She now projected feline delicacy, a demure but
concentrated look, as if deciding whether to pounce.

This air of being totally in command of herself was what Jenny Bates
hoped Annabel would project on film; this was the quality that
distinguished her from the other models in the Bates stable.  It was,
Mrs.  Bates hoped, the look that matched the female mood of the moment
the look of the approaching sixties.

Mrs.  Bates decided that before she was presented to Avanti, Annabel
needed to lose her self-consciousness and gain modelling experience'
before the camera, or she would photograph at only twenty per cent of
her potential.  As she was inspecting Annabel's composite sheet of
photographs, a frantic photographer telephoned the agency.  A model had
been taken ill at his studio and he needed an immediate replacement;
the client had specified a blonde.

"Would you try a very promising beginner?"  Mrs.  Bates asked.

"Send her around fast."  On her first assignment, Annabel was stiff and
nervous.  She felt like an artist's lay figure: it seemed to take a
conscious effort to move her limbs.

"You need to, like, loosen up," said the photographer, who had been
suggesting this for thirty years.

"Forget everything except the camera.  Ignore everyone else in the
studio.  Look, talk, smile to the camera, as if you were in love with
it."  He knew he was lucky to save his session, but he also knew that
the shots wouldn't be very good.  Beginners had a lot to learn.

Beginner models were easy to exploit too, as Scott told Annabel that
evening, over fettuccine Alfredo at the cafe des Artistes.

"Young models are notorious prey for lecherous photographers," he
warned, "especially the older ones.

It be fooled by their masterful act; don't let therik rize you with
their charisma of authority or their Y-will-look-after-you pitch. These
guys like to be seen over town with the face of the moment; they're
often domineering and frequently abusive, to keep the girls under hair
control."

Then you'd better keep an eye on me," Annabel said.

"I'm going to be guiding you every step of the way," Scott assured
her.

"Lucky me," Annabel breathed demurely, batting her eyelashes and
ignoring Scott's warning.  She had never had any trouble with older
men.  She could twist them around her little finger as easily as she
could younger men; what intrigued her about Scott was his refusal to be
thus manipulated.  He was also refreshingly non-judge mental the first
man she could talk to as openly as to her sisters, and the two of them
laughed a lot.  Besides, Scott was even better looking in real LIFE
than he was on a TV screen.

On her way to appointments, Annabel would peer from yellow cabs at the
city.  Her favourite sight was the silver, spiked top of the Chrysler
Building, which might have been built by the Wizard of Oz; that apart,
clearly the only bit of Manhattan featured in movies was the relatively
small area.  of glittering glass and steel skyscrapers around Central
Park South.  Although other parts of the city were endearingly
eccentric apartment buildings were topped by ancient Egyptian temples,
Gothic towers, or Moorish arches most of Manhattan was unglamorous,
noisy, crowded, and dirty.  But Annabel gazed with excitement at the
hectic, nonstop life of the street, where fire sirens wailed constantly
and steam mysteriously billowed up from manholes, as if direct from
hell.  The polyglot mix of nationalities, colours, and religions seemed
to tolerate any behaviour: it was clear that you could do exactly as
you pleased in New York City.

Igo Afw his fifth 'house" call, the weasel-sized hotel doctor looked
over his spectacles at Annabel and said rather coldly that in spite of
her symptoms, he could find nothing medically wrong with her and would
inform her grandmother accordingly.

"You'll have difficulty getting in touch with her," Annabel warned.

"Gran is in Chicago; then she's going to Los Angeles.  All day she
gives lectures and autographs books, and then in the evening she has
literary dinners; she says she's kept very busy."  On her telephone
calls to Annabel, Elinor had sounded weary, and her American accent had
become more pronounced, as always happened when she was tired.

When Elinor next called, Annabel announced her recovery and said she'd
really like to stay in New York.  There was so much to do there; the
Metropolitan was about to start a series of lectures on the
Impressionists, and at tea in the Palm Court, she'd met a nice girl who
was studying history at Sarah Lawrence.  Couldn't Elinor ask her pub
fisher to introduce Annabel to one or two more nice girls?

After a certain amount of argument, Elinor admitted, "I'm certainly not
having much fun -it's all too tiring."

"So you see, Gran, why drag me along?"  "Perhaps it's best that you're
in New York ... I'm glad you aren't lonely, darling.  Incidentally,
have you heard from that charming TV interviewer?"  "Had lunch with him
yesterday, "Annabel said as nonchalantly as possible.

"He showed me around the TV station."

"You sound a little feverish," Elinor said anxiously.

"Are you sure you've recover ed?"  "Oh yes," Annabel said.

"I've started to go on long walks.  Get plenty of exercise.  There's a
lot to see."  Now shut up, she told herself.  Miranda said that she
always knew when Annabel was fibbing, because she said too much, too
fast.

In fact, Annabel wasn't seeing as much of Scott as she had hoped.  He
seemed to work non-stop from ten in the ing until eleven o'clock at
night, when the news broad ended  During these hours their meetings
were brief, after the broadcast Scott took Annabel to dark bars where
tinkling pianos played brittle 193os Gershwin, or to Ii smoke-filled
jazz clubs, or to parties given by dimly it, avant-garde painters in
the lofts or converted warehouses of SoHo.  Scott seemed to find it
amusing that bohemian artists now lived where once the city's
vegetables had been Jtored.

By the beginning of her second week in Manhattan, Annabel had learned
to relax in front of the camera.  She preferred studio shots to
location shots, where there always seemed to be lighting problems and
something vital was always forgotten.

To Annabel's surprise, she found that it was very exhausting work to
dress and undress all day long.  And at the end of the day, when
everyone was exhausted, she must not let tiredness show on her face;
grimly she learned to dredge up vitality on demand.

Annabel also" found it surprising that the models were treated as if
they were wooden cigar-store Indians, with no brains or feelings;
nobody paid the slightest attention.  to them they were the meat until
the girl was needed before the camera ... when she was cooed at,
encouraged, and flattered.

By her third week, Annabel's feet ached permanently, but now,
immaculately groomed, she felt her selfconfidence increase with each
assignment and harden with each rejection.  No matter how experienced
or famous, a model always had to audition for the next job, and if ten
girls were interviewed then nine were rejected.  Often this was not
because of any lack of beauty but because one was too tall, one was too
short, another was in some other way not 'right" for what the creative
director had in mind.  Young models were philosophical about this, but
tension and anxiety were visible on the faces of those who were
approaching their twenty-fifth birthday: after that day, the skin
started to lose its bloom.

SATURDAY, 10 MAY 1958

On the day before Elinor was due to return to New York, Annabel was
called for her preliminary audition for Avanti.

In a big attic studio on Forty-sixth and Fifth, coloured background
papers fell from overhead rollers, lights stood in groups, and black
cables snaked on the black linoleum floor, a hazard even when you knew
they were there.  A group of horn-rimmed male executives from the
cosmetics firm and BBSQ, the advertising agency, were seated in a
corner on dark slab chairs; this part of the room was dimly fit.

The batteries of harsh lights in the studio were focused on a black
backdrop, in front of which each model had to walk, stand, turn, and
hold her smile-.

The door of the models" dressing room opened.

"Annabel O'Dare," an assistant's voice called.

Annabel, who had refused a seat in order to avoid crumpling her white
pique dress, stepped out and into a blaze of light.

Late that evening, in a dimly lit nightclub, Scott murmured, "Of course
you'll get the job."  He eased Annabel's collar away from the back of
her neck and blew gently down her dress.  She quivered as she felt his
warm breath lift the hairs of her spine: she could not have stood up at
that moment.  A hopeful trance of lust enveloped her body, but Scott
made no further move.  He guessed that a gaggle of lovelorn young men
danced attendance on Annabel, so he d decided not to pounce until a
disappointed Annabel s wondering why he hadn't.  He knew that she saw
other men during the day, but as she had a standing date with Scott at
eleven p.m."  he also knew that these men were not a serious threat to
his intention, which was that Annabel should fall in love with him so
thoroughly that she would pursue him.

Again Scott breathed lightly down the back of her dress.

"Where do you learn these thing sT Annabel whispered.

"In the brothels of Hong Kong," Scott breathed.

"I don't believe you."

"It's true.  I managed to wangle my way out there for a couple of
months, when I was working for the foreign desk in Cleveland."

"You ... er ... actually met Chinese prostitute sT Annabel was both
intrigued and repelled.

"I did indeed.  I learned a lot."

Annabel longed to know what but didn't like to ask.

In her private sitting room at the Plaza the next day, Elinor
stared'again at Annabel.  Not only did she look completely different
and about ten years older but she behaved with a new self-assurance.
How could her darling have changed so in three weeks?  "What do you
mean you aren't going back to England with me, Annabel?  Of course
you're leaving with me tomorrow, and I don't want to discuss this
again."

"I know you're tired, Gran, but if I don't tell you now, you'll say
I've been deceitful.  I'm staying in Manhattan."

"No you are not!  Anyway, you only have a four-week visitor's visa!
You'll be forced to leave!"  Elinor's brain tried to grapple with
Annabel's defiance.  Had Miranda behaved like this, she would not have
been surprised.  But Annabel was so gentle and easygoing.

Suddenly Elinor realized.

"It's that young man, isn't it?

The TV interviewer."  She did a double take.

"What did you mean when you said that if you don't tell me now, I'll
say you've been deceitful?  Have you been ... Have you let him .. ."
Blushing, Elinor said, "I mean ... Have you been to bed with this young
man?  "No, Gran," said Annabel, truthfully.  It had happened not on the
bed but on a rug in Scott's apartment.

"Then why do you want to stay he re?"  "Gran, I have a chance at a big
modelling job."

"If you want to be a model, you can be one in London, where you won't
be lonely and don't need a permit.  I can keep an eye on you in London.
Manhattan is no place for a young girlP "Gran, Mrs.  Bates's lawyer
says that there will be no problem about the work permit..."

"Who is Mrs.  Bates, pray?"

"You'd better meet her."  Over lunch, Elinor was slowly reassured. 
Mrs. Bates was elegant, well-spoken, and well-mannered.  Mr.  Bates, a
Harvard man, projected authority and reliability; he made it clear that
he understood and shared Elinor's concern for Annabel's safety.

"We pride ourselves on looking after our models as if they were our
daughters," Mr.  Bates promised her, "and every one of those girls
understands that her reputation is our reputation."  Elinor looked at
Annabel's imploring face, then back to the reassuring bulk of Mr.
Bates.

"Very well," she said reluctantly.

"Annabel can stay for another month, provided she stays in this
residential hotel for young women that you recommend."

TUESDAY, 13 MAY 1958

When Elinor returned to Starlings, Buzz forewarned by looked at her
exhausted, miserable face and "No need to look so low Annabel ain't
dead.  You call New York any time you please.  It only takes an our or
two to get through."  Slowly Elinor removed her coat.

"Where arc Clare and "Shopping in Warminster.  We wasn't expecting you
for another couple of hours.  What you need, Nell, is a nice hot bath.,
11 Elinor had a long soak and wondered whether her aching bones were
due to old age or that bumpy twelve-hour flight on the Britannia.  She
then put on her garden coat and gum boots and stumped out for a
comforting chat with Mr.  Jeffreys, the head gardener, who was planting
sweet corn and French beans.  After that, she wandered around the
garden, hungry to see what had happened in her absence.  As she admired
the wisteria that fell from the wall above the kitchen, Buzz joined
her.  They walked in silence, enjoying the weak spring sunshine.

"You can't keep 'em with you for ever," Buzz said eventually.

Elinor said sadly, "I never realized until now that, one day, all three
of them will leave, with never a backward glance or thought for us."

"It's only natural.  You wouldn't want it any other way."  Elinor was
not consoled.  Of course she wanted her girls to marry and have
children, and obviously, in order to do that, they had to leave home.
But Annabel hadn't left home with a husband, she had left to get a job
although heaven knew why the child should want one.

As they scrunched along the gravel drive back towards the house, Buzz
said, "Clare's got another bit of news for you.  It ain't exactly bad,
but you ain't going to like it.  No, it's her business to tell you. I'm
just warning you so you don't get in a temper and say something you'll
later regret.

Remember that Clare can be as stubborn as you are."  BuZK dug in her
pocket.

"I almost forgot!  I've got a letter here that might cheer you up.  The
rest of your post can wait till tomorrow., Elinor held out her hand for
the opened cream envelope with the O'Dare crest on the flap.  Quickly
she read the short letter from Marjorie, her sister-in-law.

"..  . Since John's death ... Of course, my daughter-in-law is very
capable ... To be blunt, I feel unwanted here ... hope you will let
bygones be bygones ... would Eke to come and stay with you ... seems
such a long time ... frankly lonely..  ."  Elinor stared at the letter.
For years, she had suffered Marjorie's spiteful arrows.  Now it looked
as if the time had come for retaliation.  Perhaps she should invite
Madorie to Starlings to subtly hurl her success in her face.  Or write
back a barbed letter, reminding Marjorie of the many occasions on which
she had been wilfully cruel to Elinor.

She reread the letter which in the past would have brought her such
reassurance.  Now that revenge was within her grasp, Elinor found it
worthless' pointless demeaning.

Slowly she tore the letter into small pieces.

"No reply," she said, and tossed the pieces to the breeze.

From her bedroom, Elinor heard Clare's Triumph two seater slide on the
gravel.  She heard shrieks of laughter, the barking of the Labradors,
the bang of the front door.

Clare, in dark grey sweater and slacks, and seventeen year-old Miranda,
in her lumpy green school uniform, tumbled through the bedroom door and
flung themselves upon Elinor.

"Darling Gran, we've missed you so."

After Elinor had presented the girls with gifts suits and shoulder bags
from Bloomingdale's, and had filled them in on the news of Annabel's
stab at modelling and her boyfriend, she said half playfully, "What's
this surprise you have for me, ClareT Clare was standing in front of
the mirror, holding her raspberry linen suit before her.  She took a
deep breath and said, "I've started to do voluntary work in London."

"But I think that's a very good idea.  The Red Cross?"

"No," Clare said.

"CND.  Ban the Bomb.  When you thought I was staying with the Bedfords
last month, I was ctually on the Aldermaston protest march, with twelve
thousand other people."  Clare looked pleadingly at Elinor.

1% Gran, if you could have seen all those people especially the mothers
with young children, who don't want them blown to bits ... Anyway,
while you were away, I agreed to work in their London office."

"And what about your sociology cour seT Elinor asked.

"That can wait.  This can't.  No use having a sociology degree if the
world is blown to bits."  Elinor was grateful for Buzz's warning.  She
had just said goodbye to one granddaughter; she didn't want to drive
another one away.  Biting back her consternation, she said, "I'm proud
of you, Clare.  I want to hear all about it and I'd like to help.  Now,
where have I put my chequebook?"

SArURDAY, 24 MAY 1958 Scott's studio apartment on East Eleventh Street
seemed simultaneously bare and covered by paper: newspapers, letters,
and files were heaped on tables, chairs, and the floor.

The afternoon was an advance warning of the muggy heat of summer, and
Scott wore only blue jeans.  He leaned back in a big black-leather
swivel chair, took a sip of white wine, switched on the record player,
and said, "Okay, I'm ready."  A sensual rhythm with a steady tempo
started.  Annabel slid out of the kitchen, wearing her severe,
sophisticated black linen suit from Bergdorf.  She looked
self-conscious and very embarrassed.

"Not too many clothes with not too many buttons, or I'll go to sleep,"
Scott warned.

Annabel untwisted her golden chignon and hair fell upon her shoulders.
Moving slowly and stiffly to the rhythm of the music, she unzipped her
skirt and stepped out of it, which left her wearing a wasted jacket,
black French knickers, garter-belt stockings, and four-inch heels with
ankle straps.

"Even slower," Scott said, "and look proud.  This is a therapeutic
exercise to overcome your physical shyness, so that I can turn a light
on now and again."

"This jacket has only two buttons and I've still not taken it off.
Can't be much slower than that."

"Don't take your shoes off," Scott reminded.

"How can I take my stockings off if I don't take nity shoes off?"

As Annabel spoke, the telephone rang.  She froze, her eyes fixed upon
it.

"Should have left it off the hook," Scott said.

"Ignore it."

"Darting, I can't.  I gave the agency your number.  They said they
might know early this evening."  Annabel flung herself at the
telephone.

"Hi!  Yes .. . I have?  Oh, that's wonderful news!"  She turned from
the telephone.

"I got it, Scott!"

"Congratulations," Scott said in a voice that didn't sound very
enthusiastic.  He knew that from now on, Annabel would be a pampered,
glamorous figure constantly in the limelight.  By later this evening,
she would be the talk of New York, and a clutch of handsome young men
on the make would telephone her, send her flowers, and ask her out to
dinner.

Annabel whirled around excitedly with her arms in the air.

"How shall we celebrate, Scott?"  tt said firmly, "Let's get married."
shod, Annabel stopped dancing.

"You really mean 4ut me prove it."  Some time later, Scott's tousled
head looked up from the crumpled sheets.  He said, "I cannot go to the
altar with IL lie upon my lips., -What do you meanT "I've never been to
Hong Kong."

"You invented that sexy rubbish?"  "Not quite ... Owl  Owl  My brother
works for a toy inaporter and they sent him to Hong Kong for six
months.  He come back with these strange stories.  Owl"

CHAPTER IO

TUESDAY, 27 MAY 1958 Clare, who had always longed to see how a movie
was made, wangled an invitation to the set of Grain Race from a quiet,
stout young man with black curls, tight as a sheep's.  She had met him
on the Aldermaston march; Steve, a graphic designer, was working on the
titles sequence for the movie, which was based on a nineteenth-century
seafaring story.

Clare shivered on Cargill's Wharf, a disused area of the London docks
just below Tower Bridge on the River Thames; it was a cold, bright day
more like March than May, Clare thought, wishing she'd worn a scarf.
Wearing a Burberry mackintosh over her green tweed suit, she had been
introduced as a freelance journalist and was doing her best to make
herself invisible on the set, standing in front of a pile of barrels,
well back from the scene, at the rear of the cobbled wharf, where
actors in nineteenth century clothes were waiting to be shot as
extras.

During the previous week, the interior scenes had been finished at
Pinewood Studios, and now they were shooting the final exterior shots.
Some of these were supposedly set in the Port of Liverpool, but the old
Liverpool docks were silted up and couldn't be used, so the scenes were
being shot at Cargill's Wharf, away from the portion of the dock still
in use, GrainAace was the story of two competing brothers: the elder
one was an adventurous buccaneer, the younger a charming, deceptively
mild, devious man.  After inheriting a three-masted trading schooner,
the brothers, with a bination of ruthlessness and good luck, built a
shipping i from which the younger gradually ousted the elder.  -neir
final confrontation came when each brother, in a different ship of
their fleet, competed in a grain race around Cape Horn; they also
competed for the wife of the skipper jDf a third ship.

The actors, wearing seafaring clothes, sat talking with it director, a
lean and anguished-looking man who wore jeans.  Clare could just hear
William Holden, who was playing the elder brother.  Justin Walton, a
thin, supple man with red-gold hair who was only just getting good
parts, played the less important part of the younger brother.  Simone
Signoret also sat with them; she played the third skipper's wife.

Holden was arguing over the emotions in one scene.

"Anyone who spots the way Simone looks at me would know she's crazy
about me."  Heedless of the cold, Clare watched in fascination as the
three actors walked through the scene, rehearsed it twice, made minor
adjustments.  The director opened his mouth to say "Action!"  Then he
paused.

"I want more barrels a bigger stack.  I can see a modern window in that
far building.  We need to block it out."

A group of assistants moved towards Clare, who was still standing in
front of the stacked-up spare barrels.  She dodged out of the way, then
crept back to her previous position.

The clapper board now reading "Take 2', was held in front of the
camera.  The director called "Action!"

Clare screamed.  From behind, a man had pushed her, sending her flying
violently forward.  She landed on her face with a strange, heavy body
on top of her, pinning her to the ground.  Barrels bounced around them,
rolling over the cobblestones.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?"  the deep voice above Clare
roared.

"T'hose barrels weren't properly stacked.  If I hadn't pushed this girl
out of the way, they would have fallen on her she might have been
injured."

The man scrambled off Clare's back and helped her to her feet.  He was
built like a bear, with a well-worn, tanned face, merry black eyes, and
abundant black hair: his wrists were hairy, and so was the top of his
chest, which showed above his unbuttoned collar.  He looked carefully
at Clare's skinned hands, her dirty face and clothes.

"Come to the dressing rooms and we'll call a doctor."  His accent was,
clearly American.

"Oh, don't bother with a doctor.  I just need cleaning up."

"Call a doctor!"  the man ordered.  He wanted to establish that there
was no serious injury, in case of a phony insurance claim later.  When
he smiled at her, Clare noticed he had slightly crooked teeth obviously
because he couldn't be bothered to get them fixed: all the other
Americans on the set had expensively perfect, gleaming choppers.

An hour later, Clare was back on the set but this time she was sitting
on a canvas director's chair.  The bearlike man the producer, Sam
Shapiro was sitting beside her.  In contrast to the somewhat tense
atmosphere on the set, he projected a careless bonhomie that was very
appealing.  Clare, who decided he must be around forty years old,
noticed how he dominated the set, with both his big physical presence
and his strong animal vigour.

"Lucky I came along today," Sam said.

"I'm not usually on the set during productions."

"Then how do you know what's happening?"  "I see the dailies every
evening, when we pick out the best shots."

"Then why were you here today?"  Clare asked.

The man shrugged.

"Shooting's always a tense time, but especially in the last week, so
the director likes a little p when everyone's exhausted.  Tempers
explode, tears !"Oow.  my role tends to change from Producer to
diploma" time keep everybody off each other's throats.  It's a tough f
or everyone because any A extra shots have to be squeezed into the
schedule, which drives everyone crazy.  In fact, we're doing a couple
of scenes here tom2ht after dark.  I have to see a guy for dinner, then
I'll be back.  D'you feel Rke dinner?"  "I'm not dressed for dinner." 
Who cares?  I promise they won't throw you out."  During the lunch
break, when the cast and crew ate in the private room of a nearby pub,
Sam Shapiro solved everyone's problems with his cheerful bonhomie. He
clearly loved action, excitement, and to be surrounded by people, all
working on his project.  Clare noticed that he was warm and generous
with praise; his laughter was a roar; his ebullient, quicksilver charm
was hard to resist.  Behind this front of camaraderie, Sam Shapiro was
shrewdly persuasive; he marshalled his arguments logically, presented
them skilfully, and" seemed able to rationalize any situation to suit
himself, while persuading everyone else that he was acting for the
general good.  Clare had never met anyone with such vitality and
authority.

In spite of his agreeable persuasiveness, Clare could see that Sam had
an explosive temper.  When the second male lead complained of a
headache and asked if he might have the afternoon off, Sam's tightly
controlled patience suddenly evaporated.  He thumped the cherry plastic
tabletop with his hairy fist and growled, "No.  I'm not going to pay
for your hangovers, Justin."  The chilling tone of voice revealed the
potential violence behind Sam's affability, which was clearly what
helped to preserve discipline on the set.

Clare managed to rush back to Elinor's flat in Chester Terrace, where
she dived into her best Belinda-, Belville.  black taffeta and
telephoned the CND office to say that she couldn't manage this
evening.

Instead, she dined with Sam Shapiro in the crimson plush and gilt
splendour of Les Ambassadeurs Club.  Clare, who had never been asked
out by an older man, and who barely remembered her father, was
fascinated by the strength and power that Sam projected.  She felt safe
and protected.  As he entered the restaurant, people sat up and
whispered to each other.

Clare sat on the plush banquette next to Sam's other dinner companion a
small, weary-looking, neat moustached banker, whose business proposals
were constantly interrupted by people who came to say hello to Sam
Shapiro.

Sam whispered to Clare, "I've known this guy for years; he represents
Paramount.  I work pretty closely with their business and creative
staff been under contract for the past ten years, on a per-picture
basis."

"How many films do you make a ye arT Clare asked.

"One picture every two years.  That's fairly slow, but I'm a working
producer.  I tend to get obsessively involved in every detail.  It
isn't the most productive way to work, but it's the only way for me."

"Are you only in England for this film?"  Sam shook his head.

"Last year I moved my base to London.  Right now, Europe especially
Italy and England are the cheapest, most efficient places to make
movies."

"Say!  Sam Shapiro!"  Another beaming dinner jacket thumped Sam on the
back and looked down at the empty gilt chair.

"May IT Paramount's banker sighed, reached across the table, and
returned the sheet of figures to Sam.

"I think we'd better discuss this some other time."  He smiled at
Clare, to whom he had hardly spoken.  He could see what Sam pastel,
ladylike look, her eva liked about her- the t charm a class act, very
different from what was ble in LA.

As Sam's navy Rolls-Royce stopped at Cargill's Wharf, the director
jumped inside.

"That bastard Justin's drunk "He clearly had a hell of a hangover at
midday," Sam growled.  11 thought you'd have had the sense to stick
close until were through with him."

"I'm not his fucking nursemaid, Sam.  I'd been going over a scene with
Bill and Simone I'd like you to see it, by the way.  Next thing,
Justin's lying in his dressing room surrounded by empty vodka bottles,
dead to the world."

"Has he been stomach-pumped?"

"Of course.  The doctor's still with him, but he's not fit to work."

"Get his agent.  Check his contract.  First thing tomorrow, I want
details of the time he's cost us."  Sam jumped out of the Rolls and
walked fast towards the trailer dressing rooms.

Just before he reached Justin Walton's trailer, the door was flung
open: silhouetted against a yellow rectangle of light was the thin
figure of the actor.  He saw Sam and staggered towards him.

"Fucking big shot!  Fucking stupid script!  Fucking lousy money.
Fucking waste of my time."  Sam did not move out of his way.

"You're the one who's wasting time, you stupid bastard."  Justin pulled
back his right fist and punched at Sam.  For a heavy man, Sam dodged
nimbly.  He grabbed the actor by the collar and called to the
director.

"For Chrissake, don't let anyone hit him!  If his face is marked, it'll
cost us more lost time.  Get the handcuffs and hose him down until he's
fit to work."

"Okay, okay."  2o6 "No, wait!"  Sam shouted.

"I've got a better idea!"  With one swift move, he pinned the drunken
actor's arms behind his back, then frOg marched him-to the edge of the
wharf and shoved him into the cold black water.

Then Sam said, "Someone dive in and haul him out.  it he drowns, we'll
be even more over budget., By one o'clock in the morning the scheduled
scenes were, miraculously, in the can, and Sam remembered Clare.  He
walked over to the edge of the set, where she sat, wrapped in a topaz
velvet cloak, U'm sorry.  This wasn't the sort of evening I had in
mind, Clare.  But we're finished here now, so what would you like to
do?  Dancing?  The Orchid Room?  The Four Hundred?, Clare, who wanted
to seem like a sophisticated woman of twenty-six, said, "How about a
gambling ga meT "Whatever you want.  Where?"  Clare swiftly telephoned
the only other older man she knew: Adam agreed to take Clare and her
chap to Mike's gambling game, one of the most popular in London.  It
had been over a year since a court had ruled in favour of a man who had
been charged for keeping a common gambling house at a London flat.
Since then, the police had turned a blind eye to smart gambling
parties, which, it was thought, would shortly be legalized.  Sam who
enjoyed an occasional gamble, took some time to lose, a hundred pounds
at chemin defer at which point he stopped playing.  He and Clare
wandered to the roulette table.

Adam looked up.

"I don't know what's got into this wheel tonight.  I've lost a packet.
I'd better see Mike."  Mike reluctantly agreed to a further loan.

"But watch it, Adam," he warned.

"You're near your credit limit and they won't extend it."

"Rubbish!  They know I bring well-heeled punters to their And they're
making a fortune from me!"  As Adam larger sums, the interest on the
money he borrowed been increased to one per cent a week.  Mike didn't
hide his worried look.

"Don't say I didn't warn you."  "I hear you've been to see Dad," Adam
said.

Mike followed his train of thought.

"Yes, yesterday.  But lies not going to kick the bucket yet."  The
previous month, lot Grant, now over sixty, had fractured his breastbone
when his Mercedes rammed a bus.  The fracture was relatively
unimportant, but, beneath it, the damage to heart and lungs was
serious.

"I'm going home again this weekend.  Like to comeT Mike offered.

"I'm trying out a new bike."  Mike still kept every bike he had ever
owned.  No longer housed in a potting shed, the elderly bikes were
sumptuously stabled in an immaculate garage at the end of Eaton
Terrace, alongside Mike's Manx Norton single-cylinder racer; his Norton
Inter, with its high-torque overhead cam engine; and the quick but
noisy BSA Gold Star, Mike's cross-country bike, used for weekend
scrambling with the boys.

"You and your bikes," Adam said, half indulgent, half contemptuous.  He
was more impressed by Mike's success than he cared to admit.  Adam felt
astonished, irritated, and humiliated by his younger brother's
prosperity and his house in Eaton Terrace.  At the age of twenty-eight,
Adam still earned a pittance in his dark and stuffy lawyer's office,
where he was only just being trusted to handle important clients.  In
contrast, Mike effortlessly earned a fortune, and seemed to live at a
permanent luxurious party, surrounded by beautiful people.

"How was Mother when you were ho meT Adam changed the subject.

"She hasn't missed one bridge game since Dad's accident," Mike said.

"She's reached the Surrey County semifinal."

Sam and Clare approached to say goodnight.  After they left, Mike
commented, "He seems a bit old for Clare."  11 "She's unlikely to meet
a teenage film producer," Adam said.

"Shapiro produced Windjammer and Whaler."

"Those Humphrey Bogart film sT Mike was intrigued.

Sam was not so.  intrigued by the two brothers.

Clare was disappointed.

"I could see you didn't like them.  But why not?"  she asked, settling
into the soft pigskin comfort of the Rolls.

"Adam seems too terribly, terribly British to be true," Sam said.

Clare laughed.

"You mean too handsome!"  Men were frequently jealous of Adam's lean
good looks, his big dark eyes and almost blue-black hair that still
flopped boyishly over his forehead.

Sam shook his head.

"Good-looking guys are a dime a dozen in LA," he said.

"There's something odd about Adam.  And his brother.  Mike's the type
who gets a charge from taking risks."  In the shadowy privacy of the
limousine, he put his arm firmly around .  Clare's topaz velvet
shoulders.

INo, it's Adam who takes risks.  Mike never gambles," Clare said.

"I didn't mean that sort of risk."  Gently he tilted Clare's chin up
towards his mouth.

FRIDAY, 30 MAY 1958 "I'd like to come home for tea just once and not
find the house full of strangers!"  Miranda fumed, after the departure
of Elinor's last guest.

"I only have tea parties on weekdays."

"Gran, you have tea parties every weekday!"

Elinor shut the heavy front door and turned to look at who stood,
scowling, beneath the portrait of the sisters painted the year before
by Pietro Annigoni.  or wished that Miranda more resembled her demure
painted likeness.

Elinor turned away from the triple portrait and snidled at Miranda.

"Surely I can invite my friends to my own home?  Be reasonable.  They
only come for an hour or two."

"Friends?  Publishers, journalists, fans, strangers!"  Mirsaid
crossly.

"Sometimes I can't decide whether I'm living in my home or your
publicity centre."  I "My visitors sell and buy my books, so they help
pay for your home," Elinor reproved.

"And it doesn't take up much time."  Elinor entertained from four
o'clock to half past five: this did not interfere with her writing and
was a relatively inexpensive way to play hostess to many people every
year.

Delighted visitors were met at the station by a chauffeur in a
claret-coloured uniform at the wheel of her white Rolls.  Over tea
served in the old-fashioned way, on a big mahogany table in the dining
room, Elinor effortlessly kept in touchw'ith her publishers, most of
whom were now accustomed to making this pilgrimage to Wiltshire
whenever business took them to Britain.  She listened carefully to
their opinions because she knew that to achieve the star status of a
best-seller writer, it took the right book published by the right
publisher, at the right price, at the right time and the right,
expensive promotion: Elinor's contractual conditions had taken years to
establish, and now before she signed their contracts her publishers
were requested to outline their promotional plans over the tea table.

Elinor's tea parties also provided her with useful feedback.  She
particularly liked to check the response of her visitors to the jacket
design of her next book.  Elinor had spent a lot of time observing
bookshop customers, trying to learn what attracted them to a book and
the jacket wA,slvrucial.

So, no matter how it bothered Miranda, Elinor couldn't give up her tea
parties.  Looking at her granddaughter now, she said without
conviction, "You know you love parties, Miranda.  All girls do!"

"Not me!"  Miranda shook her head.

"You'd like to think that, Gran, but I hate your literary tea parties
almost as much as I hate the smart London ones.  As a matter of fact, I
hate being a debl"

"How can you say that, you ungrateful child?  The season's only just
started!"

"I've had enough of it to know that I'm bored by an endless round of
parties at which the same people say the same things."

"Most girls" Elinor began.

"Would give the eyes out of their head for a chance to be a debutante!
I know, I know!  But not me!"  Miranda preferred to sneak off to the
jazz club at i oo Oxford Street, or the socially unacceptable and
totally forbidden Hammersmith Palais, where she could dance to rock and
roll.

"After all the trouble I've taken..  Elinor fumed.

-And all the money you've spend" Miranda nodded.  11 don't want you to
waste any more time or money on me, Gran."

"You haven't been a debutante long enough to decide whether you like it
or not!  Once you get to know the people better.

"I'll be yawning more!"  Miranda said firmly.

"If I asked one of those deb's delights what he thought of Harold
Pinter's dialogue, or how much MJQ was influenced by Bach, he'd look at
me as if I'd tried to bite him!"

Equally firmly Elinor said, "You've got to learn the social graces, and
I don't want to hear another word about it, Miranda!  You can't always
do as you please."  been doing what pleases you for seventeen yearsl"
retorted.

"Why can't I stay in London?  Why do I 'I've to come down here for
weekends?  You let Clare stay London by herself."

"Clare has work to do.  You're not old enough to stay Slone in London
without a chaperon, and that's final!"

Glaring, Miranda stormed off to her bedroom.  She knew, Why Clare
stayed in London at the weekend, and it wasn't 'extra work for CND, as
Elinor thought: Clare was at last in love with an older man who was
what sophistication!  divorced Miranda, of course, could be relied upon
to tell nobody, and Clare had decided that, for the time being, it was
prudent to keep this a secret.  In Britain in 1958 the subject of
divorce was for other people's families perhaps but not for one's own,
never mind allowing such a person into the family.  Clare did not want
to risk upsetting her grandmother unnecessarily, should her romance not
end in marriage.

Just then Buzz bounced into the hall from the kitchen.

"All the guests go neT "Did you hear what Miranda said?"  Elinor
exclaimed.  She knew Buzz had been listening.

"A bit of it," Buzz admitted.

"And that girl has had all the advantages we never had!"

"She's at the rebellious age," Buzz reminded Elinor.

"She's a teenager."  The teenager was a recent phenomenon: for the
first time in British history, young people were earning good money, so
after years spent obeying their parents, they could now do as they
pleased.  They spent their pay cheques on clothes and cosmetics, music
and dancing.

"Wasting it," their fathers grumbled, but their mothers, who knew what
lay ahead for them in life, said, "They're only young once." 
Christened the "Youthquake', this new market force had invaded the
media, music, fashion, and photography; the boys mode fled themselves
on James Dean; the girls wore black Jeans and sweaters, long shaggy
hair, and no makeup except for their Cleopatra eyes.

Buzz knew that, by nature, Miranda did not feel at home in the soft,
predictable world of the debutante.  With her marmalade ponytail and
pale pink lipstick, Miranda, a natural rebel, belonged with the
Youthquake.

Elinor gazed up at the triple portrait.

"None of those girls have any respect or gratitude!  Sometimes I feel
as if my heart is broken."  Firmly Buzz said, "Save that over dramatic
sentimental rubbish for your next novel!  The girls are growing up! You
should stop thinking of them as children and treat them as young women.
Remember what we was doing at their age fighting a war!  You've got to
let them go, Nell!  Then they'll come back to you.  But if you try to
stop 'em, they'll only resent you: then a visit to you will be a duty
and they'll only come when they can't put it off any longer." Elinor
glared at Buzz.  Eventually she said, "Of course, you're right, as
usual.  But I do remember the tough times we had.  I want to protect
them from that ... from danger and poverty, give them all the things
that poor Billy tried so hard to provide for Edward .. ."

"Hey, wait a minute, Nell.  This is Buzz you're talking to ...
remember?  We've been through this before, and I ain't buying it.
Usually I'd hold me tongue, but you'd better remember that the real
Billy isn't the Prince Charming you talk about at tea parties.  It's
about time, Nell, that you started to live life as it really is."

CHAPTER 11

-IUZSDAY 3 JUNE 1958

the Tuesday following Clare's first meeting witIg Sam, in Race finished
shooting.  Clare attended the wrap at which almost everybody quickly
became drunk, to the release of so much nervous tension.  Tite film
crew was friendly but cautious and overpolitc to Clare: they had known
before she did that Sam Shapiro had his eye on her.

After the party, Sam fished a black bow tie from his pocket and took
Clare to the Four Hundred.  Women in frivolous cocktail hats and
taffeta dresses energetically danced the samba under the benign eye and
baton of Edmundo Ros.  Sam suddenly felt very tired.

"Let's get the hell out of here, Clare," he said.

"I want to talk to you."  During the limousine's short journey to Sam's
flat in Hill Street, he sat with his eyes shut, his head thrown back.
Clare, sensing his weariness, said nothing.

Once, Sam turned his head to look at Clare, pretty in lime taffeta.  He
patted her hand.

Later, in his comfortably impersonal beige sitting room, Sam put his
arm around Clare in a paternal rather than lover like gesture and said,
"There's no nice way of saying this, but I think we should stop seeing
each other."  Clare felt as if her stomach had gone into free-fall.
Why?  What have I done wrong?"  She was hurt, astonished.  I'There's
only one reason, but it's insurmountable.  I'm twenty years older than
you."

"That's not a good reason to stop seeing me!"  Clare said fiercely.
With sudden insight, she realized that Sam,s suggestion must mean that
his feelings were engaged, that he cared for her, that he preferred her
to those confident, beautifully groomed actresses who had tonight
changed from their drab nineteenth-century outdoor costumes into
clinging silks and satins.

Sam looked down at Clare.

"I'm too fond of you to hurt you."  He had reluctantly decided that she
was too young to bed without a lot of post-coital trouble, Clare
twisted away from him.  She couldn't think properly couldn't think at
all with Sam holding her gingerly, the way some uncle might do.  She
threw herself into one of the elephantine leather armchairs.  Sam had
practically said that he loved her.  There was no reason why he
shouldn't have an affair with a much younger girl ... unless he cared a
lot for her ... enough to marry.

Like a candle, hope fit Clare's small, pale face; she glowed with
radiance and sat up.  She wanted to rush back into Sam's muscular arms,
smell his curly hair, feel his bristly square jaw against her own.  But
not in the frustrating grab-and-tussle embraces they bad shared
before.

She said, as seriously as she could, "I think your age is irrelevant. I
love you.  I want to marry you."  Sam had heard many a veiled proposal
usually from beneath tousled sheets but never had he had such a direct
one.  He felt spellbound by Clare's aquamarine eyes.

"What will your folks say?"  "I don't care what they say!"  Clare
rushed into Sam's arms, and he wrapped his hard body around her until
she felt that her legs could no longer support her.

"Do it," Clare said.

Sam picked Clare up and, still kissing her, carried his lime-taffeta
bundle towards the bedroom door.  Moonlight fell through the ugly
steel-framed windows.  Without speaking, he laid her upon his bed, and
gently slipped her lime shoes from her feet, as if even her feet were
precious him.  Then slowly he undid the long row of tiny, taffeta
buttons that reached from her breasts to her knees.  He gazed at her
body with anticipation and frustration: a white lace, boned corselette
stretched impenetrably from bosom to mid-thigh.

Clare trembled with passion and fear, eyes shut, waiting.  She knew
that this was the moment.  She was glad that it was about to happen
with someone mature, experienced not with a fumbling, clumsy youth.

Sam slid off her pale stockings, stroking her thighs, then felt the
dark, damp area that lay between them.  Smoothly he unhooked her lace
corselette, with nimble expertise, Clare, who neither moved nor spoke,
felt eroticism surround her like a cloud.  She thought that she would
swoon from pleasure.  As Sam started to caress her breasts, her
excitation built gradually towards its peak.  He felt for her hymen
with his middle finger, which he gently and slowly inserted into her
delicate little body.  It hurt her, a bit.

Without speaking, Sam stood up and stripped, fast as a Buster Keaton
sequence.

Clare was glad that he hadn't switched on the light, so she didn't have
to look.  But she felt it, firm against her thighs, before Sam gently
pried them apart and slid into her.  She felt his body on hers, and
smelled his odoun his scent reminded her of a sweaty horse, tired after
a good gallop; she loved it.  She felt his heavy masculine body ride
her.  Sam grabbed her buttocks with both hands and pulled them up to
meet his thrusts: as the tempo of his drive speeded up, he gasped
faster and faster.

Suddenly his body shot forward, then relaxed upon ker, as if
boneless.

Sometime later, Sam murmured sleepily, "Darling, you were wonderful."
Clare did not dare move.  She felt sticky liquid trickle down, her
inner- thighs, then a sticky tongue of flesh fall bn- them.

Sam shifted his body and lay beside Clare.  He put his hand on her
breast and whispered, "Happy, baby?"  In a moment, he was asleep.

Clare lay rigid in the moonlight.  She felt breathless, as if she
needed more oxygen in her lungs.  There was a turgid ache in her lower
back.  She wished Sam would wake up and kiss her, she longed to feel
again his mouth tugging at her nipples.

An hour later, Clare still lay wide awake.  She felt unhappy,
disappointed, and resentful not of Sam but of something.  She didn't
know what.

Perhaps love was addictive, like caviare; perhaps you had to practise
it and get used to it.  Clare wished she could talk to Annabel, in case
she was doing something wrong.

Two hours later, Clare wriggled away from Sam, moving one limb at a
time in order not to awaken him.  She groped her way to the bathroom.
Closing the door slowly to avoid any noise, she groped around the
unfamiliar space until she found a light.  She allowed herself only a
glimpse of the dishevelled person she saw in the mirror, quickly
turning on the basin tap to disguise the tinkling sound as she peed.
She then washed her hands something she normally never bothered to do,
except in a cloakroom where someone was watching her.  Subconsciously
Clare hoped that the righteous and justifiable noise of the tap would
wake Sam up, but it didn't.

Towards dawn, Clare cried quietly into her hands, then fell asleep.

Shortly after sunrise, Sam woke and again made love to Clare.
Afterwards, he felt refreshed and vigorous: he whistled in the
shower.

At eleven o'clock, breakfast for two was sent up from restaurant on the
ground floor.  A subdued Clare or only hot milk and toast; Sam ordered
a full English St.  As they ate breakfast in the beige satin bed,
leaning against the art deco headboard, Clare felt an urgent need to
know further details of Sam's divorce.  Feeling immodest because she
was bare-breasted while eating marmalade and toast, she wondered how to
tactfully approach the subject.

He had already told her about his parents, Russian immigrants who had
lived in New York and worked on Seventh Avenue: his father had been a
tailor, his mother a presser.  Sam was their only son.

"I suppose everyone asks how you got into show business?"  Clare
ventured.

"No.  Nobody except you has shown a burning desire to know anything
about me.  It was through my first wife."  Sam poured his second cup of
coffee.

"First wife!"

"We met when I was on leave."  Clare knew he had been a naval supply
officer during the war.

"I would go to LA," Sam said.  San Diego was a staid, naval town: the
women were in Los Angeles.

"After I left the navy, we got married.  It was 1945.  The only job I
could get was in a supermarket.  Sheila was assistant to a story editor
at MGM.  I read for her when she had too many scripts.  She said I
summarized well: the navy taught me that."  Timidly Clare asked, "When
did you break up?"  "We only lived together for a few months.  Then she
ran off to Toronto with another guy, but found she was three months
pregnant by me, after which the other guy ran off.

I haven't seen her since she left me.  The baby died at birth."

"I'm sorry."  But Clare felt relieved.  No threat, no passion, no
rivalry there.

"So how did you become a producer?"

Sam said, "I went to night school to study screen writing then took a
folder of my MGM summaries to the chief story editor at Paramount. Some
months later, there was a vacancy.  I was taken on as the story
editor's assistant."  No need to tell Clare of his passionate affair
with Rhona, the chief story editor.

"And then?"  Clare prompted.

"In 1948, I gave an NDG assessment to a sea story script called "A Life
on the Ocean Wave"."

"NDG?"  "No Damn Good.  After we turned it down, I met the
screenwriter."  Sam had telephoned him, pitching himself as an
independent producer with special naval history expertise: they
arranged to meet for dinner at Chasens.  Over the meal, he persuaded
the writer to agree to a contract that gave Sam exclusive rights to the
rewritten script for three years and allowed him fifteen per cent of
the sale price, should.  Sam manage to sell it.  The writer also agreed
to equal billing.  He figured, what did he have to lose?  The script
had been turned down all over town.  Even his agent stood to gain if
Sam sold the script.

Sam added, "After we'd rewritten the script for costume and called it
"Windjammer", I persuaded a ... friend of mine to get her boss to read
it.  He liked the script and wanted to buy it, but I said I wanted to
produce it.  The studio refused, but they'd shown the script to Bogart.
He liked it, so Paramount eventually agreed to my terms, I agreed to
their money, they gave me a good line producer, and Windjammer was a
success.  Then Bogey and I did Whaler, and after that, they rang me.
Anything el seT In a low voice, Clare asked, "Any other wive sT Sam
laughed and planted a kiss on her forehead.

"So that's what you really wanted to know about.  Yes, I've been
married twice a very low average for LA.  Louise and I split up three
years ago, after five years together, no kids."  "No more?"  "M swear."
Clare said, "I don't know how I'll tell Gran."

"Is there any need to tell her anything yet?"  moved into post
production which took over 6rain Race 4bree months of barely controlled
frenzy as everyone worked against the clock to release the film in time
for the "Christmas holiday season.

Sam flow to LA, first to negotiate terms and play dates with release
theatres and then to schedule the previews, at which he and the
director sat among the audiences to check reaction: by torchlight, they
scribbled notes about timing mistakes, any unscheduled mirth, or,
worse, comedy that didn't make people laugh.

When Sam was in London, Clare was caught up in the excitement for Grain
Race: she was whirled into the kaleidoscope of action and drama in
which Sam seemed to move.  But when he left for Los Angeles, she felt
deflated: every morning, she battled against inertia in order to get
out of bed.  During this period, it dawned on Clare that her passion
for Sam was matched by his passion for making movies: more demanding
than most careers, producing dominated his life and thoughts.  At
times, Clare felt a little jealous.

The month before the release date, Sam flew to Los Angeles to plan the
publicity campaign and link the trailer, the TV ads, the print and PR
campaign.  As usual Clare accompanied him to the airport.  Seeing her
sad little face as yet again she waved him off, Sam turned back and
leaned over the barrier.

"Anything to see you smile," he said.

"I'll break our news to your grandmother after the British premiere."

MONDAY, 3 NOVEMBER 1958

Like most men, Sam looked his best in a dinner jacket, so he was at his
most charismatic when he arrived at Elinor's Chester Terrace flat to
take the O'Dares to the Odeon, Leicester Square.  Sam's blue eyes
sparkled with anticipation of the movie's success: word of mouth was
good, so were bookings, and the advance publicity for Grain Race had
been a rising wave of adulation.

In her bedroom before leaving for the theatre, Elinor slipped a crimson
evening wrap over her black lace gown and murmured to Buzz, "Of course,
he's too old for Clare, but he's very good-looking."  Buzz said, "I can
see why Clare might like a mature man.  She's never known one."  Two
hours earlier, Clare had confided in Buzz, who realized that
twice-divorced Sam wasn't the dashing young earl for whom Elinor had
hoped.  Buzz had promised to soften up her old friend, but there was
undoubtedly going to be a big row because Clare was almost as stubborn
as Elinor.

After the premiere, Sam was greeted by applause from the theatre supper
crowd as he and his large party entered the Ivy.  Now he could relax.
He would wait up all night to read the reviews in the morning papers,
but the tense silence during Grain Race and the loud clapping at the
end had foretold a hit.

Two hours later, Sam insisted on interrupting his party to escort
Elinor and Buzz back to Chester Terrace; there he spoke alone to Elinor
and told her that Clare and he were to be married.

Elinor was speechless, even though Buzz had warned her ahead of time
dating him was one thing, but marrying him quite another.

"But you're too ... But Clare's far too young!"  she gasped.

P-la are doesn't think so," Sam said gently.

"She'll be ty soon.  How old were you when you married?"  "That's got
nothing to do with it," Elinor said, a hundred questions whirling
through her mind.

"I suppose you can took after Clare ... financially?"

"Very well," Sam promised cheerfully.  He was established end respected
in a way that few young men could match.

"It's too late tonight for me to think clearly," Elinor mid, suddenly
feeling exhausted.

"I'll talk to Clare in the morning."  Five minutes later, she shook
Buzz awake.

"You caWt imagine what that man's just told me!"

Buzz mumbled, "He wants to marry Clare."

"So she told you!"

"Yes, because she was frightened to tell you.  Don't worry too much,
Elinor.  We'll talk about it in the morning."  Elinor shook Buzz
again.

"I won't sleep a wink!  I must talk about it now.  It's so unexpected!
What does she know about this man?  Where are his family?  What is she
walking into.

Buzz sat-up.

"I seem to remember that I said that to you before you married Billy.
And did you take any notice?  No!  Clare's just as stubborn as you are,
so you'd better not ask those questions if you don't want to see them
marry.  Because he's a real charmer."

"Yes," Elinor said, "but what does he see in Clare?  She's aot the
glamorous type, not sophisticated.  Sam clearly isn't interested in
improving the world for a future generation; he isn't the bookish type,
like Clare.  I can't help wondering 1ow long it will last.  These
Hollywood types seem to get married again and again.  I don't want that
for Clare."  Firmly Buzz said, "Why not try looking on the bright side,
and just be glad that Clare is happy?  If you object, you'll lose her
even faster."

The following morning, Elinor knocked, on Clare's door.  As there was
no reply, she entered, and saw that the bed had not been slept in.

Just before lunch, white-faced from lack of sleep, Clare quietly pushed
open the front door and started to tiptoe across the hall.

"Is that you, darling?"  Elinor called from her study.

"Would you come here, ClareT Clare blushed as she entered the room; she
stiff wore the hyacinth chiffon gown, now very crumpled, that she had
worn the previous evening.

"Sit down, darling."  Elinor cheerfully patted the place beside her on
the sofa.

"I want to tell you how much I like Sam: such drive, such force, such
self-assurance and authority.  I'm so glad you've chosen someone older
who clearly knows his way around the world and can protect you from
it."  Clare's eyes shone with astonishment and pleasure.  "I'm so glad
you can see why I think he's wonderful!  I feel so ... safe and happy
when I'm with him."

"I hope and pray that you always will, darling.  Now run along and
change."  SATURDAY, 28 FEBRUARY 1959 "It's beautiful," sighed Miranda.
She wore dead-white makeup, ghostly pearlized lips, black-outlined
eyes; her orange hair was plaited into a coronet.

"I wish Id had a proper wedding gown!"  Annabel cried, having foregone
a formal marriage ceremony in her rush to marry Scott.

In Clare's bedroom at the Chester Terrace apartment, the two sisters
gazed at the bride: she wore a high-collared, tight-wasted,
full-skirted, calf-length dress of cream satin by Norman Hartnell; her
hair was dressed in a Grecian knot, cross-bound with cream satin
ribbon.

bly," said Clare.

"I think I'm going to cry feel wob Not on your wedding day!"  Annabel
pleaded.  Although looked love she was almost outshone by Annabel, ly
who wore a crimson silk suit and an air of triumph.  Avanti's campaign
"Do you dare to wear Avant iT had not been as successful as Revlon's
Fire and Ice campaign, but it had been successful enough to shoot
Annabel into the headlines.  American women had been surprised that an
English girl traditionally mouse burger material should project such
sensuality.  Annabel seemed to epitomize the surprising emergence of
London, as that once stodgy city metamorphosed into the fashion leader
of pop culture.

Miranda looked at her sisters and gave a mock scowl.

"How do you suppose I feel?  You've both gone and left me without a
backward look!  Off you dash with your glamorous husbands I'm the one
who should be crying!"  Nevertheless, it was tough to look forlorn in
the pale pink sat inbound tweed coat dress by Sybil Connolly.

"Nobody's going to cry," Annabel said firmly.

"We're still sisters, and when we meet, we'll still feel the same way
and do the same things."

"What sort of thing sT Clare's voice wobbled.

"Everything from a night at the opera to toe-in-mouth competitions,"
Annabel said cheerfully.

Miranda jeered, "You two old married ladies couldn't get your toes in
your mouths now."

"Bet I can," said Annabel, sitting on the carpet.

"Bet you two can't," she added as she pulled off her crimson
slippers.

Miranda immediately kicked off her shoes, sat on the floor, grabbed her
big toe, and guided it towards her mouth, but couldn't get it closer
than six inches from her Ups.  She giggled.

"I'm a bit stiff."  Clare started to laugh.

"You both look idiotic!"  Removing one slipper and carefully smoothing
her dress beneath her, Clare sat on the carpet and took hold of her big
toe.

"I've nearly done itV Miranda gasped.  Annabel mumbled, "I've done iv,
As he opened the bedroom door, Sam said, "Honey, I know I'm not
supposed to see you yet, but is there any chance of a Bloody Mary ...
What the hell is going on in he re?"

The three sisters collapsed on the floor, shrieking with laughter.

Before the reception at Claridge's, the small wedding group posed on
the steps of Caxton Hall Registry office for photographers.  Besides
being twice divorced, Sam was Jewish and thus not eligible for an
Anglican church wedding.  The photographers were unable to persuade
Clare to smile; having been very disappointed by the brisk civil
ceremony, which had about as much romance as a buff envelope, she now
felt even more wobbly and close to tears.

SATURDAY, 23 MAY 1959

"She won't allow me to do anything that's fun!"  Miranda complained to
Buzz.

"If you mean flying lessons Buzz said, "You'll never convince her that
it ain't dangerous.  She'll never allow it."  "I'm sick, sick, sick of
being treated like a baby!  I'm more likely to hurt myself skiing than
flying."

"You ain't likely to kill yourself skiing."

"Other grandmothers don't hover like she does!"

Elinor, severely depressed by the suddenness with which she had been
deprived of Annabel and then Clare, now lavished affection on Miranda,
to whom it was a claustrophobic burden.

"I feel guilty if I'm not with her," Miranda added, "and guilty when I
am because I long to get away.  She doesn't ly like the sort of things
I like, she only pretends.  I can because she gets the names wrong
Pelvis the Elvis and Buddy Holiday indeed!"

They sat in Miranda's bedroom at Starlings listening to the thumping
rhythm pumped out by Miranda's new stereophonic speakers, surrounded by
wall posters of rock heroes Buddy Holly swathed in black net and the
better-looking revolutionary leaders.

Hopefully Miranda asked, "Do you think Gran might ever get married
again?  That would take her mind off me!"

Buzz shook her head.

"She falls in love with her heroes, and they ruin ordinary men for
her."

"I don't mean that sort of love!"  Miranda said, confident that passion
could not be felt by those over thirty.

"I mean ... companionship."

"A husband likes a lot of attention," Buzz said.

"And when would Nell find time for that?  She's writing in the morning,
and still has her head in the clouds when she gardens in the afternoon.
Then there are the tea parties, and if she ain't going out in the
evening, she's doing research in a library or going to bed early with a
pile of galleys.  That's the life she likes, and what husband would put
up with it?  "Another writer?"  "He'd expect to be pampered.  And what
man would put up Iwith the fuss Nell makes over you and your sisters?
Annabel lifts her little finger and your gran pops across the Atlantic
to visit, pretending she's off to see her American publisher.  And
since Clare got back from the West Indies, Nell drives to London every
week to help her buy things for that little house.  If she had a
husband, your gran wouldn't be able to drop everything when you three
call her.  Men are used to ruling the roost.  Nell would never knuckle
under again."  In a wheedling voice, Miranda said, "Then, Buzz, darling
Buzz, will you help me do something?  Just this once?"  Buzz know that
this always meant, "Will you gently break my news to Gran, and be on my
sid eT "Wilot is it this time, Miranda?"  rant to be trained as a
beautician," Miranda said excitedly- "It's a one-year course in London,
and it starts next roonth.  I've already put my name down, but now they
want a deposit.  I thought of flogging my pearls, but what's the
paijnt?  I'll have to tell her sometime."  you mean a manicurist, a
massoower?  She ain't going to like that one bit she likes to think of
her girls being on the receiving end of all that!"  "I suppose I'll
have that "lady" rubbish flung at me again.  I Miranda bit her lower
lip.

"I've told her I hate those parties."  yot, met that nice Angus at a
deb dance," Buzz reminded- "And he's on the List."  The List was
prepared by an ageing, sycophantic gossip columnist and circulated
among ambitious mothers with eligible daughters: it fisted young Iven
whose birth, wealth, and position made them suitable escorts or
husbands.

Miraoda blushed; then, from beneath heavily mascaraed eyelashes, a
lopsided smile slowly spread across her face.  She said, "AOgus would
never waste his time at deb dances, but he had to t1irn up at that one:
it was his sister's coming-out ball."  She bad met him shortly after
Clare's wedding.  Miranda, who 100gcd to leave the overheated ballroom,
had refused another dance, yawned, looked at her wristwatch, and
reckoned she could leave in half an hour.  If she stayed awake that
10119" She had opened the French windows and slipped on to t11C terrace
for a little fresh air.

After the smoky fug of the ballroom, the dark night was quiet' crisp
and refreshingly cold.  Before her, Miranda could Only see the brown
lace outline of the huge chestnut trees lioing Rotten Row.  From behind
her came a scent that rejoinded her of Lifebuoy soap and flannel
pyJamas.

turned sharply.

"Who are you?"  "I'm Fiona's brother, Angus."  As Miranda's eyes
adjusted to the dark, she saw a large man in a dinner jacket leaning
against the wall, in the shadows, smoking a cigar.  He said, "I was
about to leave. C Jrot to get to work in the morning.  Here, take my
jacket or die of pneumonia before I get a chance to know M%11" Hie
laconic speech sounded like a paratroop commander sending his troops
into battle.

When they went back to the ballroom, Miranda turned to look at Angus
Maclayne; he returned her glance with an ice-blue stare from a face
that appeared to have been rough-hewn from rock, although his hair was
Viking gold and his moustache was ginger.

As soon as Fiona had recovered from her hangover, Miranda hauled her
out to lunch.  She discovered that Angus had been Captain of Boats and
had ended his school career as Captain of the Oppidans.  He had also
edited the Eton College Chronicle; at Oxford, where he had been a
rowing blue, he read politics, philosophy, and economics, after which
he worked for two years in New York as a trainee banker.  Angus had
then gone to Paris for a year, as a trader on the Credit Suisse foreign
exchange desk, after which he spent a year in Hong Kong, and then a
further year in New York before returning to London, where he worked
for Chase Manhattan.  He liked salmon-fishing and playing poker, and it
was difficult to make him lose his temper.

"Honestly, there's nothing else to tell you," Fiona said when pressed
for further information.

"Nobody knows much about their own brothers.  Angus is ... all right.
If you want to know him better, why not come up to Scotland for a
weekend at Eas terT "Thanks, but I can't manage it at the moment," said
Miranda; she didn't want Fiona to think she was that keen on her
brother; Miranda preferred to wait until the invitation came from
Angus.

Angus now frequently took Miranda to an evening at the cinema or
theatre, after which they ate at Wiltons, Rules, or other London hotels
that provided at great expense the food of Angus's youth: sausages and
mashed potatoes, toad-in-the-hole, milk puddings, steamed puddings,
treacle pudding, or jam roll.

In case something drastic happened to the dollar, Angus could never be
far from a telephone until late evening, which was late-afternoon
closing time for the American market.  He never took Miranda to a
nightclub because he was always at his desk by seven in the morning,
for the Hong Kong closing prices.

Unlike other fledgling bankers Miranda knew, Angus wasn't stuffy and
didn't shoot his shirt cuffs or keep tightening the knot of his tie.
Although his suits fitted well around the shoulders, not even the best
Savile Row tailor could produce a suit for Angus that didn't look as if
it had been made for somebody else: his craggy Scots frame looked ill
at ease in anything other than a heavy jersey and kilt, or baggy
trousers tucked into Wellington boots.

Because Angus was unexpectedly posted back to New York for nine months,
Miranda had to wait over a year for her invitation to Scotland.  As she
had been forbidden by Elinor to go to New York "Look what happened to
Annabel!"

, Miranda ran up enormous telephone bills, finished her beauty course,
and edged in by a friend of Elinor's started work behind Elizabeth
Arden's crimson-doored salon in Bond Street as a trainee beautician.

4ATURDAY, 6 AUGUST ig6o ""-Just before the shooting season started,
Miranda took the overnight train to Inverness to join Angus, on holiday
with his family at Maclayne.  The sleeping-car attendant locked her
into a single compartment, which contained a let-down bed and a piece
of linen called a drugget, upon which to stand while she undressed. She
had difficulty in -locating the sanitary arrangements, but eventually
discovered a cracked white chamber pot concealed in a cupboard beneath
the washbasin.

Maclayne Castle was a large, ugly, late-nineteenth century building
with fairytale turrets.  Along its long, dark corridors dashed what
seemed like many children in well darned blue jerseys and tartan kilts;
these clothes were also worn by the adults of the family and all their
friends.  Even in August, howling winds blew along the corridors, the
longest of which was from kitchen to dining room: this had been
deliberately planned, in order to prevent the odour of food from
permeating the place.  Unfortunately, it meant the meals were always
lukewarm when served.

The castle walls were hung indiscriminately with paintings: on one side
of a Lawrence portrait was a water colour of Venice done by some
Maclayne great-aunt, while on the other side hung photographs of
long-dead hunting dogs.  Also suspended upon the walls were many
ancient relics of the British Empire: assegais from Boer War campaigns,
ceremonial fly swatters from the Sudan, moth-eaten stuffed heads of
dead animals, and the occasional oar, lettered to indicate in which
university boat race it had been pulled.

Miranda decided that the castle sanitary arrangements were little
better than those provided by the railway: raised bathtubs with
ineradicable greenish-brown marks on their enamel, caused by years of
leaking taps; lavatories, encased in mahogany boxes, operated by stiff
hanging chains.

When Angus was not out shooting or fish inS he took Miranda
sightseeing, either in an estate car with a wired rear compartment to
keep the dogs from licking his cars, or in an arthritic Daimler, the
back seats of which were flecked by straw and smelled of chickens.
Angus would stop this car at the base of some heather-clad craig, and
he and Miranda would scramble to the top of it, to gaze over other heat
her-covered hills, all the colour of Angus's ginger tweed jacket.

At the knobbly summit of one of these hills, as the sun was setting in
a particularly lurid salmon-pink sky, Angus took the hand of a
breathless and puffing Miranda and asked her to marry him.  Miranda,
who had been hoping for this for months, was taken by surprise.

After she had puffed her acceptance, Angus briskly burrowed beneath the
heather and pulled out a ginger wicker basket; this contained a tartan
rug, a Thermos flask of ice, a bottle of Veuve Clicquot, and two
glasses.

At Miranda's look of astonishment, he grinned and said, "Never accuse
me of being unromantic.  I heaved this up here before breakfast."  That
night, Angus-crept along a long, dark corridor to Miranda's room, and
was allowed to enter.

Elinor, depressed at losing Miranda but delighted to lose her to the
brother of an carl, was determined that one of the O'Dare girls should
have a traditional white wedding: it was planned for Monday 3 April
ig6i, at St Margaret Westminster, the reception afterwards to be held
at the Savoy Hotel.

After her beauty classes, Miranda often drove her new purple,
custom-painted Mini to Clare's smart little terrace house in Poulton
Square.  The visits continued even after she had started to work, and
here in Chelsea, as autumn leaves drifted from the trees in the square,
the sisters pondered over Miranda's many lists.  There were lists of
guests, ess suppliers of Qf hoped-for presents, of seemingly 0 r ...
seemingly essential nuptial purchases: all details of these purchases
were of vital importance, from the correct source of invitation
envelopes Smythsons of Bond Street to the specific red-coated major
domo who would announce the guests Mr.  Pecksniff.

MONDAY, 14 NOVEMBER 196o "Why do I need fish forks?  Why does anyone?"
Miranda asked.  Clare's pert, careless, nineteen-year-old French au
pair only two years younger than her mistress was serving them tea from
an elaborate silver tray before the fire in the drawing room.

Clare, no longer a bride but a housewife, checked that everything
necessary was on the tray: tea, cake, plum jam from Starlings, and a
pile of muffins to toast.  Both sisters had kicked off their
uncomfortable stiletto-heeled, sharp pointed shoes.  Clare wore a
primrose linen suit with a short, tight skirt, Miranda a spinach-green
tweed tube with an enormous black knitted collar.

"Fortnum's chocolate Sacher torte!"  Miranda cried.

"When I'm married, I shall have it every day!"

Clare laughed and said, "Please put towels in the pink spare bedroom,
Marie-France.  My sister is staying the night."  Sam was away, on
business.

At two o'clock in the morning, Clare was shaken awake.  Alarmed, she
quickly sat up and saw Miranda's face, weakly spotlit by a silver shaft
of moonlight that fell over the dark trees of the square.

"Listen, Clare," Miranda whispered, "I must talk to you.  At teatime, I
was too ... Hell, I was embarrassed."  She climbed on the bottom of
Clare's bed, where she sat cross legged, her face again in the
shadow.

Clare rubbed her knuckles into her eyes and reached for the bedside
light.

"Can't it wait until morning?"

"Don't turn the light on," Miranda urged.

"It's easier to talk in the dark.  I can't ... I've never been able to
talk to anyone but you and Frog about sex, and I can't discuss it over
the telephone, with New York operators listening..."

"What's wrong, Miranda?"

"Do you know about Lady Chatterley's Lover?"

"Of course, everyone does," Clare said, puzzled.  A few weeks before,
Penguin Books had been acquitted of a charge of obscenity for
publishing this book after the Public Prosecutor had asked the jury,
"Is this a book you would wish your wife or servants to read?"  The
question had become a public joke.

"When Angus and I are in bed together," Miranda went on, "it doesn't
feel for me like it did for Lady Chatterlcy.  No peaks of ecstasy."
Silvered by moonlight, Clare pulled her knees up and clasped them.

"Me neither, as a matter of fact."  Both sisters were silent, until
Miranda said, "I can't understand why I find it so difficult to talk to
you about sex now, when at school we used to discuss nothing else."
Clare pushed her hair behind her ears and said sadly, "Do you remember
how we all used to wonder what a good ]over does?  And how one could be
better than the other?"

Miranda nodded.

"Well, I still don't know," Clare said.

"Sam seems to think that being a good lover is doing it in a hundred
acrobatic positions.  Sometimes I feel I'm back in the school gym."

"Angus seems to think it means banging away until I'm sore and
exhausted and sort of embarrassed for him because I know it won't work.
He doesn't seem to notice that I have a problem since he's clearly
satisfied, I expect he thinks I am, too."

"Sam says I'm frigid ... although it often feels as if but then at the
last g is about to happen to me, nt it doesn't."  I know the feeling!
Hesitantly Clare added, "Before we married, Sam said it was probably
because I was afraid I'd get pregnant- He said I'd relax after we mar
ned and then everything would be okay."  1But it wasn't?"

"No.  Now after we've made love, I get back pains that last for hours,
and I can't get to sleep because I feel so churned up I want to cry-I
"I want to shake Angus awake and kick him hard."

After another long silence, Clare said, "Who would have thought it
would be so disappointing?  I never expected to feel frustrated; I
expected to feet a oneness with Sam that I'd never experienced before,
as if we both floated on the sarneyarm cloud.  I expected ecstasy."

"That's what Gran's heroines always get," Miranda replied mournfully.

"Endless bliss in his strong arms.  How did Gran manage to convey the
idea that a virile, masterful lover was the ideal lover without
describing what he did?"

"By endlessly repeating that he was virile and masterful, as if that
was all that mattered," Clare said tartly.

"But where did she pick up that idea?  I wouldn't describe Daddy Billy
that way."  Miranda looked thoughtful.

"In fact, I can't imagine them ever doing itV "Those two certainly had
something going," Clare said.

"You could sense the electricity, even when Daddy Billy was quite
old."

"Perfect lust and mutual climaxes like Lady Chatterley and her
gamekeeper?"

"D'you suppose that's really possible?"  Clare asked.

"I've no idea," Miranda said.

"What is good sex supposed to be like?"

11 suspect that D. H. Lawrences sex was as idealized, in a masculine
way, as Gran's romantic, nc4 nickers-off sex in her silly novels."

"So how can we learn what we're missing?"  "I don't know," Clare said
helplessly.

"I thought of talking to Annabel about it: she said she doesn't have a
problem."

"Lucky bitch!"

After a few minutes, Clare said gloomily, "I must be doing something
wrong."  Miranda retorted crossly, "You're taking the blame, as usual:
that's the difference between you and me.  I think that Angus is doing
something wrong.  Or perhaps ... perhaps Angus is the wrong man for me.
Perhaps I'm too small for him."  She sighed.

"If I didn't love Angus so much ... But I'm not sure I'll be able to
live like this for ever ... On the other hand, perhaps we just need
more practice ... perhaps things will improve."

"They.  didn't for me," Clare said morosely.

Miranda looked worried and depressed.  The room darkened again as the
moon disappeared behind a cloud.

THURSDAY, 17 NOVEMBER ig6o In the dimly lit living room of his chambers
in Albany, Angus crumpled up another sheet of paper and hurled it into
the cosy glow of the fire.  At least Miranda hadn't sent him a letter
to tell him.  Yesterday she had told him, face to-face, in this very
room not that this had helped Angus to understand her reasons for
calling off their wedding.

Miranda had dodged the issue; she said she thought that, at nineteen,
she was too young to marry, she wanted to see a bit of life before
settling down, she hoped to have her own business one -day and she'd
never get around to it if she was married.  She swore there wasn't
another man, which was the first thing that had occurred to Angus.

Too young9 Angus pointed out that Miranda's mother had already given
birth to two children by the time she was nineteen.

Miranda burst into tears.  Okay, so he was tactless, but Angus had
merely meant to point out that life might be short, and it was crazy to
put happiness on hold if it wasn't necessary..  After she stopped
crying, he had pointed out that, as the wifie of an international
banker, Miranda could expect to travel a lot and so see plenty of life
after settling down; he added that he was happy to set her up in a
little business, should she want some distraction from domestic life.

Miranda had abruptly stopped looking evasive and apologetic; instead,
Vesuvian rage erupted as she repeatedly accused him of masculine
complacency.  After she stamped out, banging the mahogany door behind
her, Angus immediately telephoned Elinor, who already knew.

"Perhaps the best course of action would be to ignore her for a few
days," Elinor suggested.

"Give her a little time to calm down; the poor darling is clearly
experiencing wedding nerves well in advance of the ceremony, instead of
the night before it."  "What was odd," Angus said, "was that Miranda
wouldn't say that she didn't love me.  I kept asking her, but I
couldn't pin her down."  He added sadly, "But neither would she say she
loved me."

"Do you love her, An gusT Elinor asked.  She seemed a trifle nervous.

"Good Lord, yes!  I've never before asked anybody to marry me.  Of
course I love Miranda!"

He agreed with Elinor that the best plan was to keep calm, do nothing,
and give Miranda a chance.  She was certain to reconsider her hasty
action.

However, the following morning, Angus opened The Times to read that the
wedding of the Hon.  Angus Maclayne to Miss Miranda Patricia O'Dare
would not take place.  Only Miranda could have inserted the
announcement.  After the sixth call of commiseration, Angus angrily
took his telephone off the hook.

Now he started another letter to Miranda, but again threw it in the
dying embers of the fire.  He could not put what he felt into words.
His instinct told him that he hadn't heard all of Miranda's story; he
felt also he would have a better chance of getting what he wanted if he
kept quiet, refused to discuss the matter, and let everyone think it
was over between them.  Angus was determined to marry Miranda.

CHAPTER 12

TUESDAY, 20 DECEMBER 196o

The week before Christmas, Adam drove to Starlings in a maroon
Rolls-Royce Phantom V: this Christmas present to himself had just cost
him nearly nine thousand pounds.  He whistled cheerfully as he turned
off the main road down the bumpy country lane that led to Elinor's
home.

On a winning streak, Adam had recently paid off all his debts.
Strangely, this did not bring him relief but a feeling of unease.  He
worried that if he wasn't using all his available credit, then he
wasn't deploying all his available assets, And if he didn't use all his
assets, he would never be able to afford a house like Mike's in Eaton
Terrace.  And Adam was determined that when he could afford it, he
would purchase an even grander house than his brother's: a reassuring
facade" was just as important to his business as it was to a bank.

If he didn't make the money by gambling, he might well do so from
insurance, for Adam had just become an external member of two insurance
syndicates at Lloyd's of London.  Each big risk at Lloyd's was
generally shared among a number of syndicates, in order to reduce any
individual loss.  It was a pity that Adam could afford to belong to
only two, because the risk would have been better spread had he
belonged to, say, twenty of the four hundred syndicates.

Each syndicate member of Lloyd's had to meet the necessary financial
requirements, which included showing assets of seventy-five thousand
pounds, part of which had to be kept on interest-bearing deposit at
Lloyd's.  Although Adam did not possess seventy-five thousand pounds,
he had enough cash to lodge the deposit, and he had been able to borrow
the remainder, temporarily, in order to pull the wool over the eyes of
the council of Lloyd's, which regulated the business ethics and
standards of its market and everyone in it.

Beside Adam, on the seat of the maroon Rolls, lay his briefcase
containing a Lloyd's prospectus and also a list Of Elinor's
investments, together with their total current worth and reasoned
suggestions as to which should be sold.  The briefcase also contained
several contracts that required Elinor's signature.  After his father's
death the previous January, Adam had checked years of back
correspondence to familiarize himself with Elinor's business affairs,
and now she gratefully turned to him to advise her on all decisions; in
fact, Adam had almost reached the point where he would describe himself
as her business manager as well as her lawyer.

As the butler took Adam's coat, they both heard angry voices coming
from behind the door of Elinor's study.

"Perhaps you would care to wait in the drawing room, sir?"  said the
butler, serene as a Buddha.

"Shall I bring you sherry or tea, sir?"

"No, I'll wait here in the hall.  Whisky and soda, please."  Adam sat
on a sofa, vexed that Miranda obviously hadn't informed Elinor on the
day before his appointment, as he'd asked her to do.

As he sipped his drink, he could clearly hear what was being said next
door.

In the oak-panelled study, Elinor, in electric blue, faced a scowling
Miranda.

"I don't understand what's gotten into you this year," stormed
Elinor.

"First, you broke your engagement .. ."

"Angus and I would never have lasted," Miranda said y, not liking to
acknowledge to herself that she still 0 Oed their comfortable
intimacy.

"He'll be much happier 34th a traditional Kensington deb.  He's the
only twenty nine-year-old man I know who wants to get married and
settle down."

"That's not something to hold against him!"  Elinor said vehemently.

"Then you badgered me for dangerous flying lessons and now you want to
open a shop!  My granddaughter is not going to be a sh.opgirl!"  Biting
her lip to top tears of anger and disappointment, Elinor turned away
from Miranda and looked out past the garden, now having its winter
rest; the two flame-shaped holly trees on either side of the gate to
the orchard never failed to provide red berries for Christmas.

"And you know nothing about commerce!"  Elinor added.

"Neither did you when you started work."  Miranda, in a purple
jumpsuit, stood her ground, arms akimbo, before the slowly burning
apple wood fire.

"You would be fighting against huge competition.  Arden, Rubenstein,
Revlon "Gran, I work at Elizabeth Arden.  I know what kind of fortune a
woman spends on her face once she walks through that red door."

"Exactly!  You wouldn't stand a chance!"  Elinor turned, triumphant, to
face Miranda.

"Yes I would!  Because Arden isn't interested in someone with only a
few shillings to spend!  But I am!  Think of the millions of Youthquake
girls who can only buy old-fashioned, masklike, heavy make-up in
middle-aged colours ... Sure, they can go to Woolworth's but is
Woolworth's trendy?"

"You know how much money the big firms spend on development.  Miranda,
if there were a gap in the market, as you claim, they would have
spotted it!"

"There is a gap!"  Miranda insisted.

"And they aren't interested in spotting it.  That sort of firm simply
doesn't understand what young girls want, and they don't understand
what a lot of money these girls can collectively spend."  Her voice
rose in exasperation.

"I want to sell to the other girls I see dancing at Humph's we're
forced to paint our faces from a child's paint box.  Ask Annabel about
it.  She knows I'm right."  From Annabel, Miranda had learned the
make-up techniques used by American models.  Annabel had ransacked
Concorde, the dimly lit chemist on Madison Avenue that seemed to
contain every cosmetic in the world, to send samples to her sister.

"Why must you be so difficult, Miranda?"

"Why must you be so unhelpful?  Didn't anyone help you get started when
you were young?"

"No!"

"All the more reason why you should help me," Miranda retorted.

"I'm not going to throw thousands of pounds away on a risky, foolish
venture that has little chance of success .. ."

"Although you were willing to spend thousands of pounds on my wedding,
which I think had no chance of success."

"Let's not harp back to that again!  That poor young man!"

Miranda changed her tactics.  She jumped to the fire, took up the
poker, and prodded the smouldering wood until it flared.  Then she
lowered her voice and spoke winningly.

"Gran, I can prove that you wouldn't be throwing money away if only
you'd pay for a bit of research.  Cosmetic profit margins are huge!
Sixty per cent of the retail price goes to the manufacturer, and only
eight per cent of that is spent on raw materials."

"I don't want to hear any more of this nonsense!  It costs millions to
launch a cosmetics company ,fLubbish!"  Miranda leapt to the sofa
table, thumbed ugh a copy of Vogue, and stabbed her finger at it.  ere!
You only have to look at the small ads in the glossies to see that
there are plenty of small companies "but those ads have no style.  I
havef "You're too young, Miranda, and that's fin aW "Annabel says
there's a girl in New Jersey Adrien Arpel who started in 1959, when she
was only eighteen.  Herfather gave her four hundred dollars to start,
and now she's thriving!  What would my father want you to doT Elinor
had been halted.  After a few moments, she said in a quieter voice, "As
a matter of fact, my mind is not as closed as you think, Miranda.  I
spoke to my stockbroker.  He said that getting a line of cosmetic
products into the stores against the competition of the big companies
is almost impossible."

"A fat lot that bald old Billy Bunter knows about it!  There's still
room for starting up in your own salonl" Miranda cried.

"And what does he know about the sort of lipsticks girls want?  Look at
my face!"

Elinor looked, and managed not to shudder.

"You can't get any of these colours in London," Miranda rushed on.

"And Annabel says you can t get them in New York either!  To get a
light, shiny pink lipstick, I have to use theatrical whitener under
light pink Caran d'Ache crayons, then top it with Vaseline.  I want to
do it all with one product!  And I'm sure there are plenty of girls
like me!  And I can sell to them from my own little shops, instead of
going the expensive route in the big stores: I'm never going to waste
time flattering the buyers, or jostling for cover space, or waiting
months for late payment that'll upset my cash flow!"  Miranda
continued, seeming not to pause for breath.

"Oh Gran, won't you even let me have a market survey done to prove what
I say?  Annie Trehearne says "Your new friend, Miss Treheame, is a
fashion editor, not a fortune-teller!"  Ebullient, blonde Annie
Trehearne was known for her outrageous ideas and her uncannily accurate
fashion predictions.

"Exactly!  She's fashion editor of Queen.  Her business is spotting
trends.  That's why she understands what I want to do!  She can see the
gap!  The young want something different, and Annie senses that!"

"A pity you didn't just quietly paint her nails.  Do you tell all your
customers of your hare-brain cd scheme sT "Gran darling, Annie
specializes in hare-brained schemesl Come off it you know you like her,
really."  Miranda added, "And Annie's wheedled an advertising agency
into doing a cut-price market survey.  She told them she wants it for a
story, and she's offered to splash me when I launch.  And Adam has got
a financial projection."

"How dare you go behind my back to my lawyer!"

"Gran, I've known Adam since I was a little girl," Miranda pleaded.

"He's my friend as well as your lawyer.  And he didn't have to pay for
the financial projection.  The merchant bank prepared it."

"What merchant bank?"

Miranda moved to the mantelpiece, picked up a little globe, and started
to spin it as she spoke.

"When I go into business, Gran, I'm going to need a merchant bank,
aren't I?  Won't you please look at Adam's figures?  ... I have them
here."  Elinor looked less sure of herself.

"Why didn't you say that you had consulted Adam?  If Adam thinks
there's a possibility ... I suppose there's no harm in looking at the
figures., In the hall, Adam stood, picked up his briefcase, and knocked
on the door of the study.

Three hours later, Elinor had agreed that for Miranda's RAqwty-first
birthday present, she would buy her a little and provide enough money
for a secretary duty shop an p assistants for three years, plus
sufficient d two sho working capital to cover other overheads and
products to tock the shop.

Adam was to be Miranda's business adviser, and Mir- inda had agreed
that for the first three years she would ,aot take any action that was
contrary to his advice.

for all this" Miranda agreed not to take flying In return ks son Adam
noticed that Miranda did not say that she would never take flying
lessons.

Miranda decided to call her business KITS.  She spent the spring of
1961 in a whirl of work, not all of which she enjoyed  Rather than sell
the overpriced, branded products pro nd duced by other firms, Miranda
wanted to package an retail her own cosmetics; then, she knew, she
would have direct control over quality, packaging, and pricing, which
would also help to sharpen the identity of KITS.

She knew exactly what this all-important image of KITS should be: bold
and young, visually sophisticated but inexpensive.  It would project
excitement, and it would also be practical.  In the KITS store, a
customer could buy a set of empty bottles and boxes and then select her
colours to fill them: this meant that instead of a collection of gaudy,
ill matched bottles and boxes in her bathroom, she would have only one
well-designed, matching set stamped with the KITS logo, of course.

Miranda also knew that, where two products were indistinguishable, a
shopper tended to buy the one with the clearer public image; dull
packaging, and subsequent lack of image, was the reason for the failure
of many private label inexpensive cosmetics.  And she knew that
inexpensive cosmetics need not mean inferior ones; the same products
from One factory were frequently sold at different prices: a face
cream might cost a pound in one pack but five pounds in another pack
with a more expensive name.

Having targeted her market, Miranda now had to locate suppliers, choose
or design her make-up and her skin-care range, write her sales
literature, acquire a shop, and hire staff.

After deciding on a final list of basic cosmetics, Miranda developed
them in Elinor's kitchen at Chester Terrace, much to the indignation of
the housekeeper, who hated the pungent smells.  Miranda was less
confident about her skin-care products: although she had learned basic
formulas during her training, she planned to discuss this line with a
qualified cosmetics chemist.  So Miranda telephoned four cosmetics
manufacturers: three refused to see her, brusquely explaining that her
order would be too small to bother about.  The fourth was Ladyface.

FRIDAY, 31 MARCH 1961 Sitting in the Ladyface reception area, Miranda
fidgeted; her appointment had been for eleven o'clock it was now forty
minutes past.  Was this an example of Ladyface reliability?  "Hello,
I'm Cherry Dawson, the publicity officer."  A charming blonde in her
late twenties stood smiling in the flimsy doorway.  Her job was to deal
with time wasters like Miranda and save her charm to entertain the
press and the groups of American executives who flew in regularly from
the New York office.  Miss Dawson smiled regretfully.

"I'm afraid we have no vacancies of any sort at the moment."

"I don't want a job, I'm a potential customer," Miranda said firmly.

When Miranda proved persistent, Miss Dawson growing less charming by
the minute said that clients were not department and escorted her to
the office of Miss on, a brand manager known for her ability to get rid
of anyone, with speed.  While Miranda was describing her plans to Miss
Scotson - a suspicious and dismissive woman i her mid-thirties the
brand manager was abruptly n gummoned by her boss.

Waiting yet again, Miranda looked gloomily around Uiss Scotson's
office, a tidy white shoe box covered with notice boards.  She wondered
how it was possible to become so deeply depressed in only twenty
minutes.  She stood up, stretched, and examined the schedules on the
notice boards, none of which she understood.  She then glanced at the
pile of letters on the manager's desk: the topmost letter was headed
"Arthur Bell Cosmetic Products Ltd, Birmingham'.  The letter started:
"We much regret the late delivery of the EP02 range for Nigeria..."
Miss Scotson suddenly materialized.

"So good of you to let me know your plans, but we can't help you,
especially in view of your ... unusual ... testing requirements."
Miranda wanted.  no animal testing involved in her product
development.

"Perhaps I can help you," Miranda said pleasantly.  She pointed to a
dummy advertisement pinned on the wall.  It read, "Let your skin feel
Ladyface sink into it..  ."

"The skin is an excretory organ," Miranda said.

"You can't shove things into it, any more than you can into any of your
other excretory organs, and any cosmetic claims to do so are
ludicrous."  She stalked out.

The following Monday, Miranda's taxi drew into a grimy, dark red brick
Birmingham back street, at the end of which "Arthur Bell Cosmetic
Products Ltd" was painted on a large pair of grey gates.

Kenneth Bell, a cadaverous-faced man with a sallow complexion -and
wearing a brown leather jacket, treated Miranda as a lark, an
unexpectedly interesting happening in the dull routine of his life.  He
asked Miranda out to her first business luncheon: they sat on cane
furniture in Birmingham's first and only coffee bar, among a jungle of
rubber plants, listening to the squawks of an indignant caged macaw.

"You can get all the cosmetics you want from us, except the lipsticks,"
Ken said, spooning up runny chilli con came.

"For them, you want to visit Shama Cosmetics in Manchester, they
are."

"Can you help me with the skin-care products, Ken?  I won't feel
confident unless they've been properly tested."

"Can do, Miranda, can do."  Ken blew the froth from his cappuccino.

"A pal of mine's a dispensing chemist in Wimpole Street he'll work on
the formulas with you.  He works for them smart dermatologists in
Harley Street; you'll be safe with him."  From that day, Ken Bell acted
as Miranda's supplier, industrial spy, and adviser, and he oversaw her
ambitious efforts with fatherly concern and pride.

WEDNESDAY, 7 FEBRUARY 1962

Another important factor in Miranda's business had been choosing the
right property, for she would at first rely on sales from passing
trade.  Looking for the best and busiest street location that she could
afford, she searched for a property as near as possible to an
underground railway station, a main bus stop, or a street crossing.
Eventually she chose a small shop and overhead flat on the corner of
Oxford Street and Tottenham Court Road.

Once Miranda had signed her expensive lease, she had to move fast,
because from that point she was spending money: rent, local taxes,
utilities, insurance, lighting, heat: and refurbishment all had to be
paid, yet the shop generate no income until KITS opened its door.
Before sunrise on her twenty-first birthday, Miranda was -,"Vvsconced
in her own shop window, watching the half a working crowd shuffle past
her store.

a kewoning party that evening, Miranda needed a For her ope Striking
window display.  She had sprayed a windowQ esser s model with silver
paint and dressed her in a wild -'zlver wig with a few wisps of pale
grey net.  The model "stood with her legs apart, toes turning in, and
arms outspread, seemingly to catch a shower of crimson KITS boxes and
containers, suspended from the ceiling by invisnylon cord.  Miranda had
chosen white and crimson as her house colours, when she hired a
designer to project the KITS image: she had noticed that at Christmas,
people Always opened the red packages first.

Miranda couldn't afford a publicist, but not to worry, said her friend
Annie Trehearne.  Annie advised her to "promote herself.  After all,
Miranda had seen her grandmother entertain journalists, keeping them
informed about her books, so why shouldn't Miranda do the same thing to
publicize her make-up?  Just before the opening of the shop, leaflets
and price lists were printed entitling customers to a 'buy one, get one
free" make-up sample.  Miranda and her new assistant, Linda Grey, spent
the morning distributing these leaflets to the many nearby university
and college buildings.  This saved further money on publicity.

On the afternoon of the KITS opening, Elinor appeared in the shop to
find chaos: carpenters hammered, electricians swore, and painters
dripped silver paint.

Miranda, in jeans, stood in the middle of the confusion.

"Put those boxes on the upper shelves, please ... Careful, Jim, I don't
want another spot of paint on the floor tiles ... Did you get those
blue spotlights?,... Gran, darling!  What a surprise!"

"I can see that you're busy, dear girl," Elinor said.

"I just thought I'd call to wish you good luck and to say ... to say
that I'm sorry I doubted your business ability, but I'm right behind
you now.  Whatever happens, you can depend on me."

"Whatever happen sT Miranda grinned.

"Until the right man comes along, of course,"

At six o'clock, Miranda opened her door to the public for the first
time.

KITS looked vaguely like a smart photographer's studio: it had black
floor tiles and matt black walls; chrome theatrical spotlights shone on
the merchandise.  The sales staff wore crimson Jumpsuits.  From the
moment the door opened, K ITS was jammed with students, passers-by,
journalists, and many friends of Elinor's: she had sent a crimson
invitation to every person in her address book and had also insisted
that Miranda invite Angus.  Miranda, who had already invited Angus,
crossly told her grandmother to stop hoping.

Miranda was vexed with Elinor because she didn't like to admit to
herself that she still missed Angus far more than she'd ever thought
possible.  But she couldn't again risk making fools of both of them by
suggesting a replay.  And she certainly wasn't going to be miserable in
bed for the rest of her life.  She had suspended her search for a
suitably sized Prince Charming until she was less busy at the office;
at any rate, that was her excuse.  It was a pity that Angus had this
one great drawback, because he was so perfect in every other way, which
was why she missed him so much more than he missed her, Miranda
suspected.  Because Angus now made it clear that he thought of her only
as a friend although, of course, they weren't yet comfortably4:
10"Idly- maybe later, she wouldn't feel so stiff and un.00rtable
whenever she saw him.

In the excited atmosphere of the crowded shop, Elinor "Waved as she saw
Angus trying to push through the crowd towards the corner she shared
with Buzz.

-"Angus is the only man here who doesn't look as if he's waped from the
zoo," Elinor said approvingly to Buzz.  Vm so glad he's turned up.  I
know that Angus won't take for an answer, not with that square jaw: the
dear boy is t biding his time.  Miranda is riding on the crest of a
wave at the moment, but the time will come when there are difficulties,
and then she'll need a strong man.  That's when Angus will make his
move."  Romantic codswallop, Nell," Buzz growled, then added, "Funny
sort of cigarettes they're smoking.  No wonder youlre coughing, Nell.
We don't want another bronchitis ttack.  You've only been out of bed
for a week!"  She fimned her invitation.

"Cor!  What a noise!  And what a crowd!  And what weird clothes!"  I
But the headiest substance to get high on was not the pot, it was the
optimism and euphoria that hung above the chic crowd, which so clearly
demonstrated that fashion was no longer reserved for the daughters,
wives, and mistresses of the rich.  Annie Treheame had persuaded all
the big names to turn up.  Models talked to photographers and trendy
hairdressers; pretty girls talked to advertising men in dark glasses;
debs chatted to Bow Group young Tories; truculent left-wing journalists
argued with art directors in black turtleneck sweaters.  Cockney and
Liverpudlian accents mingled with upper class accents: "Isn't it
groovy?, - ..

"So switched on" .. . super birds" .. . Tabshop" .. .

"smashing" .. .

"totally with it'.  The evening was clearly a right rave-up.

"Annabel's late again!"  Elinor worried to Buzz.

But Annabel wasn't late; she was peering at the party through the
two-way mirror that Miranda had installed behind the back wall to watch
KITS customers and see which items they first picked up.

Miranda had insisted that Annabel who had flown over from New York
especially for the opening should not appear until the party had been
running for two hours; both sisters feared that Annabel's now famous
face would steal Miranda's limelight.  So Annabel would not enter until
all the photographers had left.  Until then, she contented herself with
her surreptitious view, and wished that Miranda would fall for one of
those very attractive men at the party instead of talking to Angus.

Finally Miranda flung open the door.

"Okay, Annabel, you're allowed in now.  Everyone please meet my
beautiful sister!"

Ten minutes after Annabel joined the party, she felt a tug at her
shoulder.  It was Clare, who looked white and ill.  She said, "Please
get me out of here fast, darling.  I think I'm going to faint.  Don't
spoil Gran's fun.  Just get me home."

Annabel drove Clare's little scarlet car back to Poulton Square, where
she helped her sister up the stairs, tucked her into bed, and brought
her a glass of brandy.

"No, darling, I don't want a drink."  Leaning back against her pillows,
Clare still looked haggard.

"Don't look so worried, Annabel, it's not serious.  I've had tests, and
I'm not pregnant although my gyno took me off the Pill a couple of
months ago, to make sure that wasn't the cause of my problem: so I'm
back with the messy Dutch cap whenever Sam gives me time to get it
in."

"But what's wrong, darling?"

"Awful back pains.  I feel as if I have a permanent, bad period."

"Where's Sam?"  "He left for Paris at dawn this morning.  He'll be back
tomorrow evening," Clare said shortly.

tentatively, "Arc things okay between you Annabel asked and Sam?" 
"Yes, of course," Clare said.  She burst into tears.

Annabel hugged her sister, reached for the box of tissues, silently
handed it to Clare, and waited until her snuffling stopped.

"Now tell me what's happened," Annabel said gently.

Clare started to speak, stopped, stuttered, stopped again, then burst
out.

"My gyno thinks my backache is because I -get physically excited when
we're making love but I don't climax so there's no relief.  He said a
man feels the same way if he doesn't climax after having an erection."
After renewed sobs, Clare wailed, "But Sam thinks I'm frigid."

"Can you masturbate?"  Annabel asked.

Speechless, Clare blushed and nodded.  Annabel said briskly, "If you
can masturbate to orgasm, then you aren't frigid and you are orgasmic.
There's no great mystery about it."

"Then why does Sam think I'm frigid?"  ""Frigid" is a man's word for a
woman who can't have an orgasm in two minutes with the kind of
stimulation that works for him."  Clare laughed bitterly.  Annabel
said, "Why don't you ... do it yourself if your back pains are so bad?"
"What's the point of being married unless we do it with each other?"
Clare added resentfully, "If Sam really loves me, he should know what I
need in bed."

"How?  By divine guidance?  ESPT Annabel asked.

"Sam isn't a mind reader: you have to fell him what you like or take
him by the hand and show him.  Of course Sam loves you, or he wouldn't
have married you, but when you're making love, you mustn't be shy about
telling him what turns you on.  Simply establish two things: what you
like and what he likes."

"You make it sound so easy."

"So it should be.  But there's only one person who can teach a woman to
be a good lover, and that's her man.  And there's only one person who
can teach a man to be a good lover, and that's his woman."

"What did you tell Scott?"  "That I like to be on top, then I can
control the rhythm and pressure.  We ... sort of rub rather than bounce
... as in rock and roll."  Clare said, "Sam doesn't like to talk when
he's making love.  Suppose he won't lis tenT Annabel shrugged.

"You can tell some men something until you're blue in the face, but if
they don't want to hear it you might as well save your breath.  In that
case," maybe you should go with Sam to a marriage counsellor."

"I keep hoping things will get better..  ."

"You've been married three years!  How much longer arc you going to
wait!  "Don't rush me," Clare said crossly.

"And how come you're such an expert, Anna belT "Scott taught me.  And
sex is practically the only thing that models talk about in the
changing rooms.  In New York, everyone talks openly about things that
the British would blush to even think about: they're accustomed to
discussing these things with their psychiatrists."  Clare gave a wobbly
laugh.

"If you told a man from Mars that the sex act was a human being's
ultimate pleasure and then described it, he'd laugh until he burst into
green fragments."  In the end, Clare found that the best way to talk to
Sam was simply, casually, to repeat her conversation with Annabel.

Sam said, "Why the fuck do you have to discuss our -private LIFE with
your sister?  Don't worry.  Lots of women can't climax."  "But I can
when I ... when I ... do it myself.

ook, Clare, nobody ever complained to me before.  Everything is
functioning perfectly, thank you."  He lay back, bare-chested against
blue-striped pillows, and clasped his hands behind his head.

"Come here and I'll prove it."  Before entering Clare, Sam thrust two
fingers up her; he twisted his wrist and wriggled his fingers around,
harder harder.  Having entered her, he thrust longer and harder than
usual, as if trying to reach some not-quite attainable spot, like a
plumber desperately trying to reach whatever is blocking the sink.

From underneath, Clare tried to do the rock-and-roll wriggle, but Sam's
hands reached down and guided her 'hips to his movement.

Afterwards, Clare, who had not climaxed, sensed Sams silent
exasperation.  Eventually he gingerly felt for her clitoris.  Four
minutes later, she climaxed.

A few weeks later, Clare reported progress to Annabel, now back in New
York.

"So everything 's fine now?"  Annabel asked.

Clare hesitated.

"Not altogether.  I can sense ... the res still something wrong ...
Sam7s trying very hard," she said.

"In every possible position.  But it ... doesn't feel loving or caring.
Now I feel as if we're a couple of acrobats, performing."

"To be blunt," Annabel said, "efficient fucking isn't necessarily an
act of love."

"The most depressing thing is ... Sam won't acknowledge that the way my
body works is normal, so that makes me resentful, when Sam clearly
thinks I should be grateful."

After a long silence, Annabel said, "Maybe you should lighten things up
a little.  You might try a little playful fantasy."

"What do you meanT "Erotic fantasy.  Next time you're in bed with Sam,
use your fantasies.  Say.- "A picture just came into my mind of you
unhooking my black satin corselette Clare looked doubtful.

FRIDAY, 6 APRIL 1962 Nevertheless, the next day, Clare told the an pair
that she would be out all day, then took a taxi to the Matelot
restaurant, where she was to meet Lizzie Bromley for lunch.  There the
headwaiter handed her a note saying that Lizzie couldn't make it
because she had a toothache.  As Clare didn't feel hungry, she took
another taxi to Fenwick, S. An hour later, clutching two large green
boxes of frivolous underwear, Clare returned home, planning to spend
the afternoon trying out a few fantasies.  She ran upstairs to her
bedroom, opened the door ... and froze.

She stared at Sam's bum moving up and down, and beyond it, the startled
face of Marie-France.

Clare's first sensations were of pain and rage, followed almost
immediately by sexual self-doubt: just what did that French au pair
have that she didn't?  It wasn'tfair!  She was making such an effort to
improve things, and had just spent a fortune at Fenwick's!  When she
could speak, Clare yelled, "Get out of my bed and out of this house.
Now!"

She dumped the green boxes on the floor, tore one of them open, dipped
into it, and started to pelt the speechless Sam with black lace garter
belts, fishnet stockings, half-cut satin bras, black chiffon French
camiknickers, a pair of long black satin gloves trimmed with ostrich
feathers, and a pair of ridiculously high-heeled scarlet patent
ankle-strap shoes.

Leaving the front door open, she then ran out of the house, towards the
King's Road, where she hailed a cab and directed it to Elinor's flat.

r had decided to sell the flat, for it seemed silly to A for just the
occasional use of one person.  She rarely ayed overnight in London and
could stay at Claridge's if she did.

When Clare banged on the door, Elinor and Buzz were there, making lists
of furniture: what to send to Starlings, "what to store, what to sell,
and what to give to Oxfam.

"My dear child, what has happen ed?"  Elinor held out her arms, and
Clare flew into them.

"I've come home," Clare snuffled against the shoulder of Elinor's grey
flannel Digby Morton suit.

"I never want to see him again!  I fV44-fti-fli-found him in
bu-bu-bu-bed with the au pair!"

Elinor tried to soothe and comfort her: "Oh my dear, you mustn't take
these things so much to heart.  I know you haven't been married that
long, but men are all the same: they have ... lusty appetites.  You
must learn when to turn a blind eye."

"Your generation might have settled for that, but I won't put up with
it!  I'm never going back to Sam!"

While soothing and sympathizing with Clare, over her head Elinor
mouthed to Buzz, "Cancel the estate agent."  Sam didn't think it
mattered if he cheated on his wife, provided she never found out: he'd
been unlucky.  Okay, he was sorry.  He grew increasingly irritated as
he realized how stubborn Clare could be; no persuasion would mollify
her fury.

For over two months, Sam tried to persuade Clare to return.

Eventually his barrage of telephone calls slowed down, then stopped. He
figured Clare would either return or not.  Time would tell.

In mid-June, three prisoners, using teaspoons, gouged an escape route
from Alcatraz.  Reading about this in Elinor's Daily Telegraph, Clare
felt similarly trapped, but without a teaspoon.  She had just received
the results of her test.  She was pregnant.  Abortions were illegal. No
escape for Clare.  Back to Sam.

TUESDAY, 18 DECEMBER 1962

Shortly before Christmas, Adam and Mike escorted Elinor and Buzz to the
theatre.  The two ladies, so handsomely escorted, felt as glamorous as
Adam intended they should.  Heads turned towards them as they took
their places in the royal box, to watch Peter Brook's production of
King Lear for the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Afterwards, over supper at the Savoy, Adam said, "I didn't much care
for that.  It was too bleak and contemporary for inc."  Again he
wondered whether he should have taken the two old dears to see Agatha
Christie's The Mousetrap" Paul Scofield acted very well as Lear,"
Elinor pointed out, careful to be positive about an evening that
somebody else was paying for.

"But anyone could have told the conceited old idiot what would happen."
Buzz said, "It ain't always easy to see what's happening, while it's
happening to you."

"Very true," Elinor said.

"Take that bookkeeper we just fired," Buzz went on.

"Fancy having to go to court for a minor gas bill!"

"An unwise choice.  I should never have trusted somebody else's
judgement," Adam said, annoyed by Buzz's tactlessness.  The incompetent
bookkeeper had led to non-payment by Elinor of a heap of small bills,
which in turn led to a bunch of complicated small lawsuits, which need
never have taken place.

"Paul Littlejohn handled the lawsuit very well," Elinor said hastily,
referring to a junior partner at STG.

uzz had complained several times that there were never problems when
Joe Grant handled Elinor's legal business; he had simplified her
affairs and Buzz had always understood them, whereas in less than a
year Adam seemed to have made things more difficult.

Elinor reproved Buzz and reminded her that her writing business had
become more complicated since Adam restructured it into a group of
companies.

Buzz retorted that she didn't understand the reasons for the
restructuring, any more than Elinor did.

"But you never question Adam's decisions.  You just do as he says, and
in MY opinion, a lot of what he says is what the army calls "That's
quite enough," Elinor had said crisply, unwilling to consider that Adam
was unreliable.  What other man could she turn to?  What other man
could advise her what to do?  Adam was understanding and sympathetic;
he lifted all the cares from her shoulders, which enabled her to get on
with her work: she would be lost without him.

As Adam consulted the Savoy wine list, a waiter approached the table
with a silver salver upon which lay a note for Mike.

Mike quickly read it, then twisted around in his chair; he nodded
briefly and respectfully towards a group of men in dinner jackets
dining at the best table in the room.

After the meal, when Elinor and Buzz had retired to "powder their
noses', Adam asked Mike, "What was that note about?"  Mike looked at
his brother with a mixture of affection, exasperation, anxiety, and
pity.

"I wasn't going to tell you until tomorrow.  I'd no idea that the
brothers would be here tonight.  I'm sorry, but they won't give you
another extension.  You've got to pay them back within ten days."

"Have I ever not paid my gambling debt sT Adam demanded angrily.

"No, but they can't afford to let other people see that you don't pay
when you're supposed to pay.  Suppose all their debtors behaved like
you dor "All debtors don't provide them with the legal services that I
do.  I've managed to ease them out of some pretty unpleasant
situations."

"Then do the same for yourself."  Mike called for the bin.

Elinor and Buzz returned to the flat in Chester Terrace to find a
message from Sam pinned beneath the door knocker: upon a hastily
torn-out page of his diary, he had written, "Clare's gone into labour
early.  I've taken her to hosp ita ., Thirty-two hours later, after a
difficult labour, C re gave birth to an eight-pound boy.

As Elinor reverently held Joshua, not yet an hour old, in her arms, she
could see the almost imperceptible ridge of his skull join from ear to
ear and the slight dip of the fontanelle on top of his downy head. Eyes
shut and sleepy, he looked small and fragile, quiet and
long-suffering.

Gently Elinor pried open one tiny fist and put her forefinger into it.
The sleeping baby grasped it firmly.  She marvelled at the tiny fingers
and fingernails.

"I hope he'll wake up soon," Elinor whispered from beneath her
face-mask to Buzz.

"In the first couple of days, before the face has fattened, you can see
what the baby will look like when he's grown up."  Suddenly the baby
opened his eyes and seemed to look up at Elinor.

She almost gasped, for the eyes that looked straight up at her were the
aquamarine eyes of Billy.

Elinor was not to enjoy her first great-grandson for long.  On New
Year's Day, Sam broke the news to Clare that he wanted to return to
live in Los Angeles.

Sam hadn't had a hit since Grain Race, released three years earlier. He
didn't think he'd lost his touch, but he 26o realized that being out of
the movie mainstream war out.  Working for the motion picture market
requires producer's presence in the marketplace, in the town where the
movie action is; the town where each inhabitant, even a waitress or
gas-pump attendant, has an agent and at least one lawyer; the town
where everyone lives, breathes, eats, talks, and definitely sleeps
movies: Los Angeles.

Sam was to find that it was easier to leave than to turn.

CHAPTER13

WEDNESDAY, 30 JANUARY 1963 After four days in Los Angeles, Clare still
felt euphoric, as if she'd stepped off the plane and traded her brain
in for a driver's licence.  Nobody could get around LA without a car in
some places there weren't even any sidewalks.  But she loved wearing
shorts in January and sauntering by the ocean in midwinter.  She also
loved listening to the way everyone talked; she was fascinated by the
quick, flip repartee of Sam's friends, the languid, spaced-out chat in
the restaurants near the beach, the omnivorous movie gossip: by the end
of her first week, she was reading the trades over breakfast.

Clare quickly found and furnished a sprawling, split level
glass-and-timber ranch house, with pool and patio, in Brentwood.
Accustomed to pleasant surroundings, she was determined to make their
home a comfortable, quiet retreat from the dazzling, dizzy, absurd,
totally unpredictable, and delightfully startling life of Southern
California, which fascinated her but also left her breathless.

Josh was far more tiring than LA.  Clare had no idea that one small
baby could be so exhausting; he was noisy, restless, demanding and
seemed to sleep only three minutes a night.

The day he found her sunburned after she fell asleep by the pool, Sam
took pity on her.  Putting his arm around Clare's blistered shoulders
he said, "Get a nanny.  No more argument about it."  To Sam's surprise
and the astonishment of his friends, he doted on the baby.  When Josh
was one month old, Sam certain that the baby could focus dearly on him,
although told him that it wasn't possible.  At two months, Sam that
those were real smiles, not wind.  At three months, e was real laughing
and excited waving of fists whenever appeared, and Josh clearly
recognized his father.  Sam's problems always vanished when he lowered
the ed, wriggling Josh into his bath, or made silly goo-goo at the
pram, or crawled on the terrace like a bear, or '0 11MIMC.1csfully to
coax the four-month-old Josh to ".1gy'Dad'.  Elinor hired a young
English nanny who reminded Clare of a small, bright-eyed blackbird.  In
the way that people tend to gravitate towards each other when feeling
slightly homesick, they quickly became friends, and from the day Kathy
arrived in LA, Josh metamorphosed into a quiet baby; he lay in his pram
or crib or rug, blew bubbles, gurgled, burped upon demand, and gave no
trouble: Clare thought it most unfair but was delighted, and so was
Sam.

After Kathy's arrival, Clare started to entertain.  In LA, this, was
serious business.  nothing like having your friends over for supper.
Sam needed backup, and Clare was determined to help her husband as much
as she could: she remembered the success of Elinor's daily tea parties,
and methodically applied her considerable organizational ability to
throwing lavish soirees.  Clare was not needed at Sam's business
breakfasts in the El Padrino Room of the Beverly Wilshire or lunches at
the Brown Derby or Scandia on Sunset Boulevard, but she presided over
all evening entertaining, whether at home, in the leafy courtyard of
die Bel Air Hotel, or at Romanoff's.  Sam's oldest friends were
particularly impressed by his classy English wife, granddaughter of an
internationally famous, best-selling author; not only was she pretty
and young, Clare was an effortless and charming hostess which is more
than anyone could say for either of Sam's previous wives.

sam had to work hard to reinstate himself, and the first order of
business 'was to locate the right script.  He spent his time searching
for material, while trying to ignore the cold claw that gripped his
stomach and pocketbook as he realized the world's indifference to Sam
Shapiro.  Sam had reached the time of life when it wasn't so easy any
more: he was still in the game but only by the skin of his teeth, and
he knew it.  So did everyone of consequence in LA, except Clare.  Sam
was still welcomed with a flourish by the maitre d's.  Cary Grant and
Frank Sinatra still nodded to him.  But there were little things, like
being demoted from Swifty Lazar's "A" list to the agent's V list: these
things reminded everyone that Sam hadn't had a hit since Grain Race.

Clare had known before she came to LA that being married to a movie
producer wasn't as glamorous as she and her envious and astonished
girlfriends in England had once thought.  She learned quickly that the
annual seasons were no longer spring, summer, autumn, winter, but
research and development, preproduction, production, post production
and marketing.  But Clare did not know that Sam's money was running
out: the income from the big hits had gone in taxes, alimony, and
surprisingly high overheads.

Not realizing that Sam couldn't afford it, Clare continued to entertain
lavishly.  One evening in late April, she telephoned Annabel in New
York and reported, "We're having seventy-five to supper this evening.
I've had such a pretty, yellow-striped marquee set up beyond the
pool."

"I don't get time to entertain formally at home," said Annabel.

"So if it's business, we take them to "21", and if it's friends, I
invite them for brunch on Sunday."  Clare giggled.

"That wouldn't do in LA.  Sunday brunches are considered tacky.  So are
beach picnics or any casual get-together.  Here the entertaining is
rather oldfashioned and formal.  I give big parties and dinners for up
to at home the caterers are wonderful, by the way anything in between
takes place in some smart hotel."  And are these parties filled with
beautiful actresses and sexy starlet sT Clare giggled again.

"Never.  The important people are -family men, so there are never any
beautiful starlets at the bat parties, in case they make the wives feel
insecure.  A lot of sensational-looking women wander in and out of the
i-Ikotels and restaurants but you'll never find them at the best
parties.  And you never invite unimportant actors, in case they might
pester someone for a part.  No, the whole point of these parties is to
do deals, to put all the right people together so that the next picture
gets made."  None of Clare's entertaining showed the returns for which
Sam hoped, however.  I Because of his anxiety over his career and his
failure to reinstate himself, Sam had neither surplus energy nor
libido.  He and Clare made love regularly, and Sam dutifully gave
orgasms to Clare, who although she didn't say so still felt that
something was missing.  There was no spontaneous excitement, no loving
warmth; she was not swept to the stars in his arms.  Crossly Clare told
herself that her expectations had been as stupidly unrealistic as one
of her grandmother's breathlessly ecstatic heroines.

One afternoon, when Annabel phoned, Clare found herself asking, "How's
your love life, darling?"

After a pause, Annabel said, "Mechanical."

"Yours tooT "I always know when Scott's got something big going on at
the station, because his head is someplace else when he's with me."

"I don't believe it!  After you had me believing that Scott was God's
gift to women?"  "He seems to be taking a sabbatical," Annabel said
curtly, and changed the subject.

. Clare bad noticed that SaWs libido perked up when young actresses
clustered around him at poolside bars and in smart hotel lounges; for
them, a producer was a producer, and Sam s 'till had his reputation.
Sam clearly felt soothed by this flattering attention, but Clare felt
sad, and a little jealous.  She wished she had what those women
obviously thought she had, which was what she herself had expected: a
powerful, all-protecting, sexy husband.  Perhaps if the two of them
could get away alone to some perfect place ... When Sam asked Clare the
day after her big party if she'd like to accompany him to the Cannes
International Film Festival, he was surprised when she decided to leave
Josh alone with Kathy for ten days: but Clare looked forward to a
carefree second honeymoon.

Unfortunately, at the last minute, Sam unaware of Clare's romantic
plans invited Elinor, who was recovering from another bad bout of
bronchitis; he thought she would be company for Clare, who would then
not mope around alone all day while he he hoped put deals together. Sam
decided to stay at the Carlton rather than Elinor's villa in St-Tropez,
which was too small and too far from the action.

MONDAY, 6 MAY 1963

One week later, Clare, Sam, Elinor, and Buzz sat on the terrace of the
Carlton Hotel under a dazzling sun.  White yachts flitted across the
bay; crowds on the beach peered at starlets; photographers snapped
girls in spangled bikinis, mink bikinis, and flower-covered bikinis.
Clare could spot no stars: Sam said they generally stayed in the hills
behind Cannes in luxurious rented villas, descending only for their own
screenings when the publicity machine had been organized to receive
them.

and Sam smiled at each other across the table.  She happy to be here
watching the cinematic rites of ngElino r noticed the exchange and felt
relieved.  A baby %'-'"often reunited a couple who had been having
problems.

"ifte hoped that little episode was behind them.

week later, cigar smoke wafted from the windows of the Carlton and the
Negresc o as negotiations became and deals firmed up-, but Sam seemed
to have no part in them.  Clare learned not to ask, "But was anything
definite agreed?"  after he returned weary but still hopeful from lunch
with some big player at the hotel du Cap or the Eden Roc at Antibes.
Sam's wonderful aura of assurance, which had originally captured
Clare's heart, was visibly wilting.

Then one evening, Sam and Clare dined at the Majestic with a
distributor who had clinched deals in seven major territories, was
clear to closing another nine, was working at his negotiating strategy
for the remaining twenty-one major territories, and just hoped he could
pack it all into the remaining week of the festival.  Watching Sam's
face, Clare wondered if her husband's desperation was as clear to other
people as it was to her.

After dinner, she suggested a stroll along La Croisette, the
palm-tree-lined promenade: she hoped that the two of them might walk in
the dark beneath the stars and forget the feverish atmosphere of the
festival.

On the darkened beach, small groups of young people drank, smoked,
talked, laughed.  Who are they all?"  Clare asked.

"Young movie hopefuls and out-of-work actors you've already seen most
of them; they prowl around hotel and restaurant lobbies, deeply
disappointed to find they're talking to each other and not Dino De
Laurentiis or Franco Zeffireffi," Sam said.

"They're all impoverished dreamers, would-be screenwriters, directors,
and producers.  They turn up from all over the world, carrying cans of
film, files of projects, ideas, treatments, scripts ... Most of them
will have sold nothing by the time they fly back to reality."

"But what are they all doing on the beach?"  "If they can't find a
cheap pension outside town, they sleep here."  Clare could not feel
sorry for these healthy young hopefuls necking in the moonlight on a
Riviera beach.  But she felt increasingly sorry for Sam.  Lack of
success seemed to make it necessary for him to talk a little louder,
tip a little too much, flirt a little more with would-be starlets, who
didn't realize they were wasting their time.

As they reached the deserted end of the beach, Clare nudged Sam.

"Let's go down on the sand," she suggested, taking his hand.

Where the sand ran into the dark sea, Clare kicked her shoes off,
turned to Sam, and put her arms around his neck.

"Let's forget everything for a few minutes," she whispered.

"Let's forget, movies and money and deals and doubts.  Let's enjoy the
soft sound of the sea on the sand.  Let's enjoy each other."  Sam
pulled her close and said helplessly, "I can't figure out what I'm
doing wrong ... I'm sorry, Clare."

"It doesn't matter.  Forget it for a few minutes."  She took his face
in her hands and kissed his mouth hard.

"Nobody can see us."

They kissed with passion, holding each other tightly.  For once, Sam
allowed Clare to share his human vulnerability.  For the first time, he
felt her strength and reassurance.  For the first time, he shared, in
whispers, his doubts, fears, regrets.

Clare pulled his head down and kissed away his words.

"it doesn't matter, Sam.  I swear it doesn't matter.  Forget that. Just
remember that we're together ... and I love crushed her against him,
and Clare could feel his feed or her.  And there on the damp, cold
sand, Clare fivally felt what she had always yearned for, the release
she d searched for: to her surprise, she recognized Elinor's
descriptions of twin souls uniting.  Finally Clares d-for moment came,
as she and Sam shared joy.

TUESDAY, 14 MAY 1963

On the eighth morning of the festival, Elinor gazed around the lobby of
the Carlton, lined with film posters for Cleopatra and Tom Jones.

Beside her, Buzz sniffed, "Bloody circus.  Crowds everywhere.  Waiters
rushed off their feet.  Can't get a decent cup of tea Behind her,
Elinor heard drifts of conversation.

"When does your plane lea veT "Why, whenever I'm ready, of course."

"..  . I can't get decent vegetable gardeners."

"I have a couple of Filipinos.  Costs forty dollars a carrot, of
course, but at least I know they're fresh .. ."

"Richard Burton isn't going to buy that chiteau at Saracen after all.
Sounds like alimony .. ."

"Did you hear that, Buzz?"  Elinor said.

"Do you suppose that chiteau really is for sale?  Why don't we drive
there and see?"  She knew that Saracen, one of the few unspoiled
medieval French villages, had been deemed a national treasure: no new
building was allowed.

Buzz grunted, "Anything to get away from this lot."  So they picked
their way past the Afghan hounds, disdainful borzois, and exquisitely
groomed Pekinese, whose owners sat in the sun drinking champagne or
expensive bottled water.  Elinor obliged two Scandinavian backpackers,
who asked for her autograph.  Eventually they found Sam's
air-conditioned limousine and drove east.

In contrast to the noise, heat, and dust of Cannes, the surrounding
countryside looked eager, freshly washed, and pretty as a girl before a
dance.  To their right was the sparkling azure sea; to their left were
lavender fields and dark green forests, behind which mountains rose, to
fade in soft lines of mauve back to the white horizon.

None of Saracen's labyrinth of winding streets were wide enough for a
car, so the air of the village was fresh and clear.  Some of the
streets opened into small, unexpected squares, each shaded by lime
trees around an old stone fountain.  The narrow houses had mysterious
porches and bridges that crossed from one building to another; on many
a worn wooden door hung the iron hand of Fatima, to ward off evil
spirits.

The high ironwork gate of the chfiteau creaked open at Elinor's
tentative touch.  She and Buzz walked into a cobbled courtyard choked
by weeds.  Against the castle walls grew white oleander and rosemary
bushes, and trees that drooped beneath strange, pale yellow blossoms:
the branches were so low that the two women had to stoop beneath a
ragged arch of green and yellow to reach the front door an ancient slab
of oak studded with ironwork of different periods.

They rang the bell and waited.  Elinor'looked up to see, high above
her, a row of narrow slits.  She imagined the castle defenders hiding
behind, shooting arrows at invaders.

Just as Elinor decided that the building was deserted, the front door
was slowly opened by an unsmiling grey-haired woman who wore a cotton
overall and a pair of sneakers, cut to allow her bunions to protrude.
This caretaker confirmed that the chdteau was for sale, but she knew
nothing of price or avaiiability; it was for the agent to occupy
himself with such matters.

Eventually Elinor persuaded this harpy to telephone for the agent, a
thin, dismissive young man who clearly didn't take these English women
seriously.  Everyone knew that the English no longer had money.  At
breakneck speed, he showed them around the chAteau.

The building was not in a good state of repair: the interior was damp,
and the plaster was peeling.  Some of "the shutters were hanging off
the windows, some were missing, and none had been painted for years.
The two upper floors were a dusty, shuttered warren of bedrooms.  The
only bathroom had been installed before the First World War, and there
was no central heating or air-conditioning.  The agent assured the
women, somewhat unconvincingly, that the chAteau was kept warm in
winter and cool in summer by the six-foot-thick walls.  Their tour
ended where it had started, on the south terrace overlooking the sea.

Elinor sauntered to the ivy-covered balustrade.  To her right, in the
distance, the Bay of Nice curved like a Dufy painting, edged with tall
palm trees and pretty villas.  Below her, rough-hewn grey rock fell
abruptly to a sandy crescent of beach, where the sea was aquamarine
shot with silver: beyond the bay, the water spread, deep blue, to the
horizon; the colour changed to indigo as it met an azure sky, across
which clouds sailed, fat as cupids, in the brilliant, dazzling,
inimitable light of the French Riviera.

"And the price?"  Elinor slowly turned to the dismissive agent.

Buzz suddenly realized that this was no casual spring afternoon
excursion.

"What would we do with a place this size?  Just look at the mess it's
in!  Ain't been cleaned since it was built, if you ask me."  She
snorted.

"You're a romantic idiot, Nell!"

Both women knew that Elinor would buy the chiteau.

Later, as they walked downhill in silence Elinor noticed that a
surprising number of trees grew in the narrow streets and little
squares: weeping willows, olive and apricot trees.  They drank coffee
at the only caf, in a street studded with tubs of pink geraniums;
pigeons swooped to pick, up the cake crumbs that Buzz threw.  Then they
wandered past the dark green, studded door of the syndic at d7nitialive
and the lavender shutters of the local cooperative to the pale-blue
painted mairie that stood next to the blue and green pharmacy. Opposite
the ancient Church of St.  Peter was the village shop; in the window,
plastic champagne glasses stood next to a jumble of red fly swatters
bottling jars, dusty casseroles, insecticides, local eau de cologne,
honey, and herbs.

"It's almost too charming," said Elinor.  These quiet sunny streets had
altered little over seven hundred years.  She and Buzz had driven only
a short distance, but they might have been a thousand kilometres from
the hustling streets or Cannes.

"It's a rash, impulsive move," Buzz grumbled on the return journey.

Elinor laughed.  Having unexpectedly and romantically been tempted by
fate to leave Britain, she could see only the advantages: no more fog,
no more bronchitis.  Instead, sunshine, warm sea, delicious food and
wine.

"Won't you miss Starlings?"  Buzz couldn't believe that Elinor would
leave her beloved garden.

Elinor suddenly became serious.

"Starlings isn't the same since the girls left."  The silent void that
Starlings had become made Elinor miserably conscious that the girls no
longer lived there.  Everywhere she looked, something reminded her of
them and made her long to relive the past.  In her own home, Elinor
felt homesick.  Perhaps at Saracen, she would find a new way of life;
perhaps there she could took forward, instead of being constantly and
pain tugged back by memories.

On the following morning, Paul Littlejohn, now a junior er rtn of
Swithin, Timmins and Grant, flew from London Nice.  Funded by money
earned outside Britain and not bject to exchange controls, Elinor
eventually found herss v -M mist re of the ancient French chfiteau.
Although this-was a relatively simple arrangement, Paul Littlejohn
managed to make it sound as complicated as the division of Berlin
between the Allies, and charged accordingly.

Buzz urged Elinor to query the bill.  Elinor said that she had Adam's
assurance that the charge was normal for such a transaction.

"It ain't normal to buy an eleventh-century castle," Buzz retorted.

"And why does that Mr.  Littlejohn always write "done under request" on
his letters to you?"  .

"I request it and he's confirming it.  What's wrong with that?"  Elinor
asked irritably.

"I expect the wording covers some legal point, or has something to do
with exchange regulations.  Besides, it's not something for us to worry
about.  Adam and Mr.  Littlejohn know what's best for me, and I trust
them.  Now where is that decorator?"

CHAPTER14

THURSDAY, 12 SEPTEMBER 1963 Adam sauntered up the marble steps of the
Clanrickard Club.  Two years before, the law had been changed to allow
gambling in Britain; since then London had become one of the world's
gambling centres.  The grandest London clubs were Crockfords in Carlton
House Terrace; John Aspinall's Clermont Club in Berkeley Square, which
attracted the richest and most daring gamblers; Les Ambassadeurs, where
you dined, danced, and then went upstairs to play chem my and the
Clanrickard Club, run by Mike Grant.

As Adam reached the door, the owner, Toby Stitch hurried out.  Adam
hadn't expected him to be there so early in the evening.

Toby Sutch paused.

"I expect you've come to settle your account, Grant, without any
trouble."  "

"That's what I'm seeing Mike about," Adam parried realizing what Toby
meant by 'trouble'.  An immaculately dressed Old Harrovian, Toby Stitch
was a tough bully, accustomed to being obeyed.  His powerful
self-confidence attracted people who couldn't control their gambling,
and who often became dependent upon him.  He introduced such people to
moneylenders who provided six-month loans for four per cent monthly
interest.  Should there be a repayment problem, toughs visited the
borrowers and persuaded them to pay up.

Adam entered Mike's office without knocking.

"You're late again, Adam," Mike said from behind his rosewood desk.

"You'd better make this quick, because I'm meeting Miranda to show her
a shop I've found in Pimlico."  iran da can wait."  Adam st in a
leather chair and propped his feet up on the desk.

"I want a whisky and soda d a quick word with you, about Miranda's
business!  "She's expanding at the speed of light," Mike said.  Mirhad
acquired seven shops in eighteen months, two of h had been found by
Mike, who had property connecons, a good nose for a bargain, and plenty
of free time during the day.  Using her first shop as collateral,
Miranda had borrowed from the bank to buy the lease of a second shop,
near Holborn.  Using the second lease as collateral, she had then
similarly purchased the lease of a third shop.  As she had launched her
business just before a small London property boom, Miranda found that
her collateral value seemed to increase weekly with no effort on her
part: the steadily rising KITS profit figures reassured the bank of her
ability to leverage property in this way.

Adam said, "She's spending too much of her time on property deals when
she should be running the business.  She's got an eye for good
property,-but she's not adept at dealing with the people who sell it:
estate agents have little respect for a woman, particularly, it seems,
if she's young and pretty.  But you, little brother, have a flair for
real estate, and you know how to hand lethe agents: you can wine and
dine them here, introduce them to some nice girls, drop the occasional
envelope of cash, and learn to lose at golf.  Then you'll get first
pick of properties for sale.  It won't take up much of your time.
You'll get two per cent commission."

As he poured Adam's drink, Mike's clear grey eyes looked worried.  He
knew the hidden drawback to this reasonable-sounding deal: if he
accepted it from Adam, Mike would be expected to persuade Toby Sutch to
extend Adam's credit.  But Mike did not want to ask any favours,
especially not from Toby.

Two per cent, "Adam said firmly.  Reluctantly Mike nodded.  Adam stood
up.

"What Miranda needs is to get her operation under one roof.  So look
for a large industrial building, somewhere outside London, in central
England where rents are lower.  That way we can locate the factory,
warehouse, garages, and offices in the same place."

"Why not build?"  Mike suggested.

"No time.  "Adam downed his drink and left.

FRIDAY, 24 APRIL 1964

"I love it, Buzz," Elinor said as she waited on the south terrace for
her guests to arrive: the traditional finishing feast for the builders
was about to start.  Saracen would be ready just in time for the film
festival.  This year, Sam would have one of the most impressive
backgrounds on the Riviera to conduct his business.

The stone masons wives had baked pizzas and prepared huge bowls of
chopped tomatoes, olives, and onion, marinated cucumber, walnuts, and
lambs'-foot lettuce all tossed in the local salad dressing that used
sesame oil instead of olive.  Champagne and Provengal vin rose had been
opened, and the homemade lemonade was pressed from local lemons.

Elinor had enjoyed every minute of the restoration.  Her French
architect had strengthened the structure and roof beams, then renewed
the tiles on roof and terrace.  He tore out the foul-smelling bathroom
and the kitchen, which consisted only of a sink with a cold tap, and
installed a new kitchen and many bathrooms.  All peeling wallpaper was
scraped off, and the walls and ceilings were plastered creamy-white
magnolia.  Windows were replaced, woodwork painted, and floors
polished.  The new electrical system provided indirect fighting, so the
walls and ceilings glowed.

d VI Aile this work was in progress, Elinor and Buzz vi site auction
houses of Nice, Toulon, and Draguignan.  They frequented antique shops
off the beaten track, in the hills, where they purchased splendid beds,
fruit wood tables, armoires, and charming antique chairs; modern sofas
were ordered from Nice.  The village dressmaker, Madame Ansewed all the
curtains, made of cream linen, after "Elinor purchased four bales at a
Toulon auction.  During the restoration work, Elinor and Buzz stayed
alternately at the hotel de Provence and the Fountain Hotel; fierce
rivals, they faced each other across the Place de la Republique.  The
Provence was ran by a matriarch of ormous family.  ninety-three, Madame
Sartour, and her en

The Fountain was run by a male couple, Americans, known as les pedes.
When the Fountain hired a chic Paris decorator to install soft lighting
and cover the walls in toile de Jouy, the Provence didn't bother to
change its unflattering fluorescent lighting but installed a swimming
pool.  The Fountain retaliated by moving four-poster beds into all the
best suites, whereupon the Provence announced Saturday evening
barbecues ... Now, content with the results of her building upheaval,
Elinor leaned against the terrace balustrade and looked up at the
chateau.  The newly painted white shutters were faintly tinged with
pink, a blush applied by the still-golden evening sky.

Seeing her pleased expression, Buzz asked, "What do you like best about
it, Nell?"  To Buzz's surprise, Elinor did not pick the spectacular
view, or the silver four-poster bed that had once belonged to a Spanish
princess, or the elevator that plunged three hundred feet down to the
beach.

Elinor slowly smiled.

"I like to think that Billy would be proud of me."  Buzz stared at
Elinor; she knew that took on her friend's face."  Elinor was playing
one of her own heroines.  This place was like one of the stately, homes
in her novels; here in Saracen, Elinor could live in the sort of
imaginary world she created for her readers a world she had actually
come to believe in, where she no longer separated reality from fantasy,
fact from fiction.  Part of Elinor's fantasy was the myth of Billy
O'Dare, the perfect romantic lover; in her mind, she had re-created him
as a strong, dependable hero, forgetting his weaknesses, his excesses,
and his ill-treatment of her.

Buzz turned for a moment and looked at her friend.  They had known each
other so long, and still Elinor amazed her.  Billy!  How she clung to
his memory, reinventing him still, after all these years.  Buzz knew
there was no point in once again trying to remind Nell of the true
nature behind Billy O'Dare's easy and intoxicating charm.  He had been
the one man she truly loved, and there would never be another.

"I wonder ... I wonder what he would say if he knew I had bought a
castle for myself," Elinor said.

Buzz suspected that Billy would laugh and say, "You could buy
Buckingham Palace, old girl, but you won't change Marjorie's opinion of
you."  Buzz said, "I'm sure Billy would be proud of you, Nell." 
MONDAY, 12 OCTOBER 1964 Miranda, her long flaming hair pulled behind a
navy Alice band, wore a navy dress with a white organdie Pierrot collar
for the first executive meeting in her new sales office - a converted
warehouse off Oxford Street, found by Mike.  Sitting at the head of her
egg-shaped, white plastic boardroom table, she was surrounded by her
male executives.  Adam sat on Miranda's right; she had recently
persuaded him to join her board as a part-time director.

Adam had appeared reluctant to accept this appointment d had pleaded
other commitments, but he had finally capitulated after Miranda agreed
that, should KITS ever go public, she would sell Adam fifteen per cent
of the total issued shares, at a nominal sale price of fifteen thousand
pounds.  Miranda considered this share option a minor concession
compared to the advantage of having the experienced Adam on a board
composed of people who were young, enthusiastic, and talented but had
never before been directors of a company.  Adam made Miranda feel
safe.

For a brief moment, Miranda wished that her two sisters could see her,
sitting at the head of her boardroom table while everyone listened to
her and took notes of what she said.  No longer was she the littlest
sister, to whom no one paid any attention.  She was an emerging star of
the business world.

Miranda said, "The first item on our agenda is the acquisition of
Framwells."  This was an ailing chain of small London tobacconist
shops, which had not yet been put on the market.  KITS financial
resources, already stretched to their limit, would be subjected to even
greater strain should KITS acquire Framwells.  But they could not risk
this unique chain falling into the hands of a rival.  So the board
voted to buy Framwells.  It would be expensive, but worth it.

All further items on the agenda were briskly agreed upon, until the
final item, a hosiery manufacturer's offer of a licensing deal, which
caused argument.

Adam spoke persuasively in favour of the deal.

"We would get an assured income for lending the KITS name and logo and
publicly endorsing the product.  All you have to do, Miranda, is make a
few public appearances wearing their tights: they then have a public
image, While we have a decent profit margin without working for it."
Linda Grey nodded; she was no longer Miranda's assistant, but
publicity manager.

"We've built up a very clear image of a young, smart, intelligent woman
who wants sophisticated merchandise at reasonable prices, and we
project that image through Miranda herself.  Customers buy her products
because they see her on TV and read about her in the papers.  They see
Miranda as glamorous, fashionable, and giving good value.  We have a
high-profile managing director who projects a household name."

"Yes, that's our asset, and we're not fully exploiting it," Adam
said.

Miranda wrinkled her forehead.

"You said the same sort of thing about franchising.  I know this sounds
like money for nothing, but that's what's worrying me."  Linda said,
"If anything's wrong with the product, the manufacturer won't get
blamed by the customer KITS will."

"And that dissatisfied customer won't only stop buying the tights
she'll also stop buying KITS cosmetics,"-Miranda said.  She added,
firmly, "We can never be sure that goods sold under our name are up to
standard if they're manufactured by somebody else -because we don't
control the quality."

Adam smiled.

"Would you agree, theoretically, that it is a good idea to use our name
to sell other goods if we can control the quality of those goo ds?"
Looking puzzled, Miranda nodded.

"We employ full-time marketing experts because that's cheaper than
using consultants, and it gives us more control'" Adam said.

"So we have a first-class, underemployed marketing division."

"That's unavoidable, until we can afford to expand," Miranda said
defensively.

Adam smiled again.

"Then why don't we set up an acquisitions office, to buy old-fashioned
firms that are solidly established but getting nowhere because they
have no clear image, so nobody wants to buy their products?  of
licensing tights, why don't we buy some ailing P'tocidng firm such as
Daintyfeet and put our name on

The financial director, Ned Sinclair, threw up his thin hands in
protest.

"You're suggesting that we turn KITS into a holding company!"

"Why not?"  Adam said.  "We'd be running before we can walk!"  Ned
objected.

"But it's boom time," Linda said slowly.

"And very few manufacturers understand what's happening in fashion
right now."  Adam nodded.

"Exactly.  The Youthquake."  Everyone started to talk at once.

Two weeks later, the board of KITS decided that the holding company
project would be pursued, provided adequate financing could be
arranged.  The new company would be called SUPPLY KITS to avoid
confusion with KITS.

Adam's responsibility as commercial director would be the development
of SUPPLY KITS  He would seek small companies with a weak image, which
needed design, publicity, and marketing services but had good
management staff.  There was one essential ingredient to every
potential company: it had to generate cash, in order to provide SUPPLY
KITS with a steady income, with which to repay the bank loan necessary
for its acquisition.

"Adam " d'you think you'll be able to do all this while working
part-timeT Miranda asked worriedly as the two of them sat in the
boardroom after the office had closed.  I "I don't see why not, "Adam
said, pouring Dom Prignon for both of them.

"Mike finds the companies and Ned produces the figures I need from
their own accounts."  "Mike's last bill was pretty high."  28o I The
contract I drew up specifies that Mike gets two per cent, but it
doesn't specify w1wn."

"You mean .. ."

"Legally, we could wait a thousand years before paying it., Miranda
said sharply.

"If I buy somebody's services, I want to pay for them."

"Business is business," Adam said.

"My little brother should have checked out his contract with a lawyer."
He topped up her glass.

"Relax, Miranda.  Business isn't a life or-death matter it's a sort of
game, a huge gamble; it's exciting, and that's something you seem to
have forgotten lately."

"I worry that the stakes are getting so high, so fast."

"That's what's exciting!"  Adam said, his eyes shining.

"Perhaps it's getting too exciting for me," Miranda suggested.  She
noticed that Adam had relaxed the careful reserve with which he
normally treated her.

"There's no such thing as too much excitement."  Adam grinned.

"Especially not when you're around, Miranda.  You create it, you know."
Surprised, Miranda looked at Adam's handsome face.  Was he really
flirting with her?  Was she reading an invitation in those dancing
brown eyes?  Did she want to?  Miranda remembered the painful calf love
she had felt for Adam long ago in St-Tropez, when she was a vulnerable,
flat-chested schoolgirl.  She remembered Adam's perfunctory politeness,
and her misery.

"You didn't always think that," she said.

"I do now."  Adam leaned towards her.

Swiftly Miranda told herself that she couldn't afford to get
emotionally involved with Adam: he was too important to her business.
Suppose they had an affair and then broke up perhaps he would want to
leave the business.  She couldn't yet manage without Adam's calm
reassurance, ts authoritative decisions, his brushing aside of ami his
strength of purpose.  She could only just manage with him.

Miranda stood up.  She wasn't going to mess up her new career.

F-VRIDAY

25 DECEMBER 1964 y Christmas, Elinor and Buzz had settled down in Sara
Th only major change in Elinor's work routine had e that she now flew
to London to do her research instead of travelling by train from
Wiltshire.  Buzz super three bilingual secretaries, who came daily from
Nice to deal with correspondence, clean-type Elinor's ma nuN A Aq
scripts, send them to relevant experts for checking, then dispatch them
to the dynamic American agent who had sold Elinor's work around the
world since Joe Grant's death.

Early on Christmas morning, Elinor's bedroom door burst open.  As
always, Elinor's heart looped the loop as two-year-old Josh appeared in
Donald Duck pyjamas.  The k" child's eager blue eyes reminded her so of
Billy.

Frantic with excitement, Josh showed Elinor the contents of the knobbly
red stocking that he dragged behind him.

Sitting up in bed, wearing a purple paper crown and pulling a cracker
with Josh, Elinor felt happy and replete.  She wanted nothing more from
life: all the people she loved were gathered today under this ancient
roof.  Sam, Clare, and Josh had flown from California, Annabel and AW11
Scott from New York, Miranda and the Grant boys from on don

cry Later, wearing dressing gowns, ev one ate a champagne breakfast in
the cream-tented pavilion by the swimming pool, which was used as an
outdoor dining room.  Josh ate seven tangerines anId raced around the
terraces on his new French tricycle a present from Father Christmas.

Sam gave Clare a gold neck chain; she gave him a primitive Greek
painting of a fishing boat.  Annabel gave Scott a set of Mark Cross
luggage; he gave her a green leather Gucci jewel case.  Miranda watched
her two sisters hug their husbands and suddenly wished again that she
hadn't broken up with Angus.  But it wouldn't have worked.

Elinor murmured to Buzz, "It's wonderful to see the girls together
again, so loving, so loyal, so happy and secure!"

Buzz smiled.

"They're making as much noise as ever they did.  You'd think they was
teenagers again."  Since the arrival of the sisters, their
conversation, which consisted of half-sentences and puzzling allusions,
had been constantly interrupted by giggles and shrieks of laughter.

"And the men seem to like each other."  Elinor nodded with
satisfaction.

"Everything is going well!"

Standing beside Miranda at the buffet table, Adam whispered, "Annabel's
put on weight, hasn't she?"  "I always thought she was too thin,"
Miranda said without conviction.

"Well, she isn't now."

Annabel, who was sitting with Clare by the pool, was aware of her
weight problem.  When her bookings started to slide, Mrs.  Bates had
crisply told her to lose twenty pounds and given her the telephone
number of New York's smartest slimming doctor.  With great effort,
Annabel had shed three pounds.

"I love your jewel box," Clare said cheerfully.

1 chose it myself.  If I hadn't, Scott would have sent a secretary out
to buy something for inc."  Surprised, Clare said, "Scott must be ...
very busy."

"Nobody need be too busy to buy his wife a Christmas present.  Scott
isn't interested in me any more."  be silly, "Annabel  He's here with
you, isn't he?"  e laughed.

"After six years, you can't expect the same attention that you had as a
bride even though you're supposed to be one of the world's most
beautiful o en."

"I get no attention!"

"Rubbish.  Men fall at your feet and you flirt with everyone in sight
even Adam."

"I mean that Scott ignores me not here, of course, in it-ont of you
all.  If I flirt, it's only to reassure myself that other men still
find me attractive."

"Cool it," Clare said curtly.

"Remember, it's Christmas."  She didn't want to think about marital
flirtation.  Sam had resumed his disguise of masculine invulnerability
as soon as they returned to LA two summers ago, and Clare never again
penetrated his armour or shared the loving warmth they had experienced
when their minds, as well as their bodies, were joined on the darkened
sands of Cannes.

Clare had started to suspect that Sam was a compulsive womanizer; she
noticed the too-casual way certain women spoke to him at parties and
the way his black eyes twinkled when they did so.  She told herself
that Sam's affairs were probably not much more than one-night stands,
and that adultery was almost unavoidable in his business, but such
rationalization did not assuage her sadness.

Beyond the pool, Mike strolled to the terrace balustrade, against which
Adam leaned to watch a speedboat skip across the blue water.

"Shall we take a boat out after lunch?  Just you and me?  Get away from
Elinor's family set piece?"  Adam said cheerfully, "If you've got a
message for me, Mike, tell me now.  No need to go miles out to sea for
privacy."  Mike hesitated.

"You're in trouble if you can't pay back your debts by the end of the
year."  He paused again.

"You know what I mean by trouble.  This time I can't do anything! "You
can make sure Miranda doesn't hear about it," Adam said crisply.

"And don't worry.  I'll fix it.  I always do, don't IT "They all say
that.  Until the day they can't fix it."

"Ease up, Mike.  Remember, we're here to have fun.  Okay, this
afternoon we'll sneak away on the speedboat, escape from Elinor's
brood."

"Nothing wrong with the O'Dares," Mike said, "except they pick
god-awful men."  Adam nodded.

"I don't mind Sam, but Scott is unbelievably vapid only interested in
his job."  Scott seemed incapable even of playing Monopoly without
being interrupted by calls from his New York office.

Mike said, "I prefer Scott to Mr.  High-Powered Hollywood.  Can't think
what Clare sees in him."

"Maybe the father she never had.  She fell for his air of assurance,"
Adam said.

Standing together at the far side of the pool, Scott and Sam, both in
bathing shorts, watched the Grant brothers.

Scott said, "I can't think what these women see in that insufferable
couple of snobs.  And they both talk like faggots."

"Nah, they're just British," Sam said.

"Stand up when a woman walks in, leap around to pull chairs out they
all behave like footmen in a costume picture.  I don't mind Mike, but
Adam's a royal pain, and he behaves as if he owns everything in sight!
Later, as they dressed for lunch in their bedroom, Sam looked at the
maroon Cartier travelling clock that Adam had given Clare for Christmas
and said, "Why's he so generous to you?"  Clare laughed.

"Surely you're not jealous of Adam?  Can you hook my back up, plea seT
course I'm not jealous of that pompous legal asshole.  Ican't think why
Elinor invited him for Christmas."

"Because Adam is almost family, and his parents are both dead.  And
Gran would be lost without Adam she's got into the habit of relying on
him."  Sam shrugged his shoulders.

"Some lawyers can be a very expensive habit."  " In the late afternoon,
after a traditional English Christmas "Ainner had been served in the
dining room, Elinor listened happily to the shrieks of laughter around
the table.  She gazed with satisfaction across the oak refectory table
to Buzz, with whom she had shared so many Christmases; what a pity it
was that Joe couldn't see his sons, so handsome in their light suits
and Christmas-gift ties.  How wonderful it was to see them and her
girls together again still happy, still friends after all these years,
and all reunited under one roof.

She was pleased that the girls had bothered to dress up, although their
clothes were a little startling.  Miranda wore a cream lace trouser
suit over a nude body stocking; Annabel wore a white mini dress and a
bonnet of daisies tied with satin ribbons beneath her chin; Clare wore
a sleeveless Jumpsuit of scarlet linen edged with mustard.  Buzz wore a
Pucci blouse-and-pants outfit in turquoise silk, which is what she had
worn every Christmas Day for the past seven years, after inheriting it
from Elinor, for whom the outfit had been a little too tight.

How lucky she was, Elinor thought, gazing around at all the beloved
faces.  Her heart felt settled when they were all together, in a way
that it had not done since her last granddaughter left home.  She
decided to make a little speech and tapped the table.  Slowly the happy
chatter subsided.

Elinor lifted her glass of champagne, but found herself unable to
speak as happiness welled up from her heart.  She smiled and said, "To
our happy family."  Her words were echoed around the table as everyone
raised a glass.

CHAPTER15

MONDAY, 19 JULY 1965

From her office window, in the west corner of the chiteau, Buzz could
see what was happening anywhere on the two main terraces.  Now, she
stared out only at empty space shadowed by the late afternoon sun.
Soon, thank God, things would return to normal.  Elinor would be
sitting out there again, and they'd be having their usual glass of
champagne before lunch.  The days of anxiety and concern were almost
over; Elinor's recovery would, of course, be slow, but that didn't
matter.  Buzz had warned Clare that there were to be no more arguments,
and now all Elinor had to do was get well.

Buzz's office was briskly efficient; she did not care to spend one
second more than necessary in it, and nothing was superfluous in the
sparsely furnished room.  It held filing cabinets, bookshelves, and a
desk upon which an unused IBM typewriter crouched like a grey
electronic cat.  Behind the desk stood a sturdy swivel chair.  In front
of it were two nineteenth-century metal conservatory chairs for
visitors; they were not very comfortable: Buzz didn't like people to
stay too long.

Buzz looked at her watch.  If Adam didn't arrive soon, he'd be late for
the telephone calls he had booked.  She opened the door and gazed down
a splendid vista of reception rooms that opened out one into the next,
which Buzz had learned was typical of grand French houses.  Adam
appeared in the distance; he hurried through the bar, the summer salon,
and the television room before he finally reached the privacy of Buzz's
office, which contained the only telephone that did not have
extensions all over the chiteau.  Buzz left the room.

An aggressive French operator informed Adam that his first call had
been delayed; as he waited impatiently, he glanced at the bookcases,
which held first editions of all Elinor's books.  Adam swiftly read the
titles, most of which contained romantic words like 'love', "heart',
"arrow', "passionate', "fire', "dream', "kiss', and 'enchanted'. Dream
Of the Heart, Passionate Fire, and Fire of the Heart in particular
caught his eye.

Unlike many men, Adam did not regard Elinor's books as a subject for
jokes.  He remembered a conversation he'd once had with his brother,
who had teased him about his interest in the works of Elinor Dove. With
an earnestness that had surprised Mike, Adam had responded
forcefully.

"You're wrong, Mike.  Leave it to the intellectuals to deride romance
novels.  Men like you and I can learn from them.  They are our
guidebooks to what women want.  Often a woman reads them because they
supply what's lacking in her relationship; she doesn't yearn just for
sex, or even for love she also needs romance.  And so does a man, or at
least he does when he first falls in love, when he's too caught up to
pay any attention to what other fellows think.  Then gradually, when
reality starts to intrude again, he gets embarrassed about the
sensitivity he's shown, and so he gradually pushes it away, to deny
it's even part of his nature.  It's a trap we all fall into, something
I don't see changing soon.  And until it does, Mike, until men and
women are equal partners in romance, men who understand how women
particularly married women feel about romance will always be able to
twist them around their little fingers."

Adam could truthfully tell Elinor that he read every word she wrote and
found her books absorbing.  This was because he used them as
guidebooks.  He coldly worked coldly gave Mt.  what each of his women
wanted, and then to her.  And it worked.  Given this level of
knowledge, shnost any man could become successful at seduction.

Adam answered the telephone on the first ring.

"Mike?  Great to hear from you.  How's the new bike?  ... How do I
know?  Because you always have a new bike.

In London, Mike laughed.

"Ifs a rather nifty Ducati.  Three fifty with single overhead cam.
Handles very well, but a bit unreliable.  I've had trouble twice and
she's only three weeks old!  His voice became serious.

"How's Elinor?"

"Much better.  No more talk about scattering her ashes over the
Mediterranean by moonlight.  She'll soon be well enough to make her
will."

"Does that matter now?"  "Not now, but it will someday, and I'm not
risking this scene again."

"I'm so glad she's better," Mike said.

"Dlyou remember how great she was to us when we were kids?  She lent me
the money to get my second bike that Triumph Speed Twin: it had a lot
of poke for the size.  When I went to repay Elinor, she wouldn't accept
the money."

"Is that why you wanted to speak to me urgently?  To discuss Elinor's
health?"  "Unfortunately not," Mike said.

"I called to tell you that you have to pay Toby Stitch, and fast."

After a pause, Adam said, "I'll talk to Giles."

"He can't lend you money.  As of last Wednesday, Giles Milroy-Browne is
doing seven years in an open prison, for embezzlement."

"Toby's waited longer than this before."

"Exactly.  He's running short of patience.  I can't fix it, Adam.
Remember, Toby has already paid your French gambling debts."  Mike
wished to God that when Adam went to the south of France, he would stay
on the beach like everyone else.

It don't know what I'd do without you; Mike," Adam said winningly.

"Just keep Toby off my back for a few more days.  Let him think that
Elinor may go at any minute.  imply that I might soon have funds."

"I can't do that ... I don't know how you're going to get it, but you
know how deep the shit will be if you don't produce at least a hundred
thousand pounds .. ."

After replacing the receiver, Adam stared through the French windows to
the terrace, drumming his fingers on the desk.  He tugged his hair over
his left eye, then jerked his head to flip it back: a gesture that
revealed his anxiety.  He smoked a cigarette, sucking hard at it.
Finally he called Johnny Briar, a member of his insurance syndicate at
Lloyd's.

"What's the news?  It can't get much worse, old boy," Johnny said.

"We've had unbelievable bad luck.  We seem to be the only syndicate
that's involved in all three natural disasters.  American Insurance
Services have just released final estimates on the Chile earthquake. Of
course, we reinsured for a cut of the premiums, but we'll still stand
to lose well over, sixteen million dollars.  No final figures yet on
the American tom ado

"And the tidal wave in Pakistan?"  "They reckon it killed sixteen
thousand people."  Eventually Adam asked, "How soon will we know our
final loss esT "It looks like an open year.  No money will be paid to
members for three years,", Johnny said, "and probably a further call
after that.  Frankly, this'll clean me out.  I'll have to sell the
house."

Adam cursed.  The famous Lloyd's unlimited liability probably meant
that Adam would also be declared bankrupt.

"How long will they wait for payment?"  "You know Lloyd's don't wait,
old boy.  It's cash on the nail as soon as the arbitrators reach a
settlement the 9s reputation stands on that."  Johnny added, "It's not
messing with Lloyd's, Adam, you know it isn't: no one would ever touch
you again Lloyd's would see to that."

Adam's next call was to Ned Sinclair, financial director Of SUPPLY KITS
With an effort, Adam steadied his voice.

"Ned?  I want you to take another look at that new" Carefree proposal
the duty-free airport shops.  I know they're asking more than we want
to pay, but if we can assemble a package of cash, stock options, and
newly issued shares as a good inducement, I think we'll convince the
key manager and he'll persuade the others to sell.  So talk to him, see
what he wants, then stitch something together for next week."

"I'm already working on it," Sinclair said cheerfully.

Adam sighed as he replaced the telephone receiver.  Again he ran his
left hand through his hair, but this time he felt a tingle of
anticipation.  There was always something around the corner if you
didn't lose your head.  He had a definite feeling of success about the
Carefree deal.  And there were plenty more deals.

And perhaps it was time to play the trump card up his sleeve.  He'd
never be in a better position to do it.  Perhaps it was time for a
little more reinsurance.

Annabel's call from Scott came through to Saracen just as dinner was
announced.  She raced upstairs to her apartment and threw herself on
the bedcover, a Welsh patchwork quilt in a soft pattern of cream and
pink.

Waiting for Scott to pick up the telephone, Annabel could visualize the
scene at the TV station.  She could clearly remember the first day that
Scott had shown her around, could remember being impressed by the
overwhelming glamour of it all.  From that day, Annabel had worshipped
him.  She sometimes felt that were Scott not sitting at the studio
news desk, face made up and hair sprayed, ready to roll and clearly in
control why, then the news might never happen.

Eventually Scott's voice came through faintly on the line.

"Angel, you aren't going to like this one bit, but you asked the agency
to call me as soon as Avanti decided.  They don't want to renew your
contract."

Annabel suddenly felt that her mind was spiralling out of control.  Her
forehead felt clammy and her hands began to shake.  She found it
difficult to swallow.  Her heart was thumping so loudly that she
wondered for a fleeting second whether Scott could hear it.  Her
ribcage seemed too small and she panted for air.  She also felt a
sudden, massive drop in the pit of her stomach, the place where her
selfconfidence dwelled.

"Annabel?  Are you still the re?"  Thousands of miles away, Scott heard
a gulp.  He said reassuringly, "Angel, it isn't the end of the
world."

"It is for me," Annabel said.

Exhausted by anxiety and emotion, Clare had decided to go to bed early.
In the thirty-foot-long, dark-panelled bedroom, she lay upon the
Jacobean four-poster bed and gazed up at the crimson brocade canopy.
Stripped down to her petticoat, she felt too tired to undress further.
She wished that someone would invent a button that you pressed, and
shazam!  you were tucked in bed, washed and with your teeth brushed.
Languidly she turned her head to the west facing windows, staring out
at the neighbouring mountain high above the hill upon which Saracen was
built.

Again Clare wondered if she had gone a bit too far, speaking so
negatively about Gran's novels, and being so emphatically against the
trust.

Hearing a knock, she called, "Come in."  Slowly the door opened.

e of her husband.  the doorway was the craggy out ling looked sheepish
and apologetic.  For one glad moment, Clare wanted to rush to him, put
r head against his big chest, feel his strong hands stroking her back,
and let Sam do all the worrying for her.  But she remembered the sight
of him in bed with that would-be and fought the impulse, staring
angrily at him initead.

"What a re you doing he re?"  came as soon as I heard that Elinor was
... ill.  It I, was in the Tribune a couple of days ago.  I came to see
if needed me.  And if Elinor is going, I- want to say goodbye" Very
touching, but Gran is getting better.  You needn't have come."  "I
know.  Adam already told me.  He was about as welcoming as you are.
Why's he here if she's recovering?"

"Adam has every right to be here," Clare said pointedly.

"He's been our family lawyer for years."

"I'm not the only one who doesn't trust the devious bastard.  Buzz
doesn't like him," Sam said, "and she is a lady with a very reliable
built-in shit detector."

"Adam isn't Gran's only lawyer," Clare retorted.

"There's another chap, Paul Littlejohn."

"From the same firm?  Then he's probably under Adam's thumb."  Suddenly
Clare realized why Sam had come, and cried scornfully, "You can't
criticize Adam for being devious!  I suppose you are straightforward?
You've just hurtled halfway round the world only to say goodbye to your
estranged wife's grandmother!  How touching!"

Sam nodded.

"Of course, I'd also like to see Josh."  "Not now.  He's asleep!"

"I know.  I was told by a French sourpuss nurse in the hall; she's
clearly had charisma bypass surgery."

"You should see the day nurses!"  Then Clare was vexed that he'd
almost made her laugh.  She stiffened as Sam shut the door and took two
steps towards her.

Hopefully Sam said, "I also want to see you."  He advanced, a dark,
disturbing masculine presence.  Each time Sam took a step forward,
Clare took a step backwards, towards the windows.

"You're seeing me now!"  she said.

"I haven't changed much in four weeks."

"I have."  Sam took another step.

"That contrite line won't work any more, Sam."  Clare's voice was cold.
Retreating until she bumped into a Spanish walnut table that stood
before a window, she put her arms back to lean on the table, then
decided that her position might look inviting, folded her arms, and
scowled at Sam.

"I have enough to worry about," she said crossly.

"Please leave, Sam!  You can come back and see Josh in the morning but
don't think you can march in here and wheedle your way back into my
heart in half an hour not this time!"

"Of course I know I can't change things in half an hour.  I've had four
weeks to realize what a stupid bastard I've been," Sam said.

Clare cried, "You don't want a real relationship, you only want
ego-boosting, pseudo-relationships!"

"I admit that's what it has been like in the past."

"I've had enough!"  Clare stormed.

"You think that if I don't know about your affairs, it can't disturb
our relationship.  That it doesn't matter if you cheat on your wife, so
long as she doesn't find out.  But it does matter because our
relationship becomes dishonest.  Even if I don't know it, you do, and
that changes your attitude to me."

"What the hell do you mean by th at?"  Sam seemed genuinely
perplexed.

"You invent, or goad me into, some failing to give you cause for
complaint, so that you can then screw around with a clear conscience.
Well, I've had enough of being the who doesn't understand you!  Now I
do understand And I can't stand your treachery and deceit!  I can't
that parody of a happy life in that parody of a Place.

"No more affairs, I promise."

"It's no use, Sam.  We both know that history will only at itself.  You
want to nibble every biscuit in the tin, d nothing will ever change
you!  I'm never going to forget t I saw or stop wondering whether it's
happening n.

Sam's mind quickly returned to the last time he had n Clare, when she
had returned early from the beach to wd Sam in their bed, and not
alone.  Clare had recognized the girl the would-be actress daughter of
a neighbour who had been kind to Clare when the Shapiros first moved P.
Under Clare's glare, the frightened girl had shrunk against the
headboard, her knees drawn up to hide her slim, naked body.  Clare
continued to stare until the girl scuttled from the bedroom to the
patio; there, she hesitated, remembering her nakedness.  Desperate, she
cast one backward glance at Clare, then fled.

Hairy and naked, Sam had crouched on the bed feeling exposed and
helpless.  Then Sam had thrown her a pleading look, like a naughty
little boy caught with his finger in the jam pot.

Finally Clare had screamed, "I've had enough of these scenes."  Without
being told, Sam knew at that moment that Clare would leave him.  This
time she would Ring no bitter accusations or black lingerie at him.  As
he stared at the torment, fury, and despair in her face, he knew that
Clare would not forgive him.  He also knew that this disastrous episode
was entirely his own fault and could easily have been avoided.  After
all, he could have taken the girl someplace else.

Now Sam looked at his wife as she stood at the en dof the long,
dark-panelled bedroom, her back to the window, beyond which olive trees
rustled in a hot breeze.  Leaning against the walnut table, Clare felt
her face tighten as she, too, relived that painful scene.  Slowly she
said, "I hate to admit this, but what hurt as much as the treachery was
the humiliation.  My self-esteem disappeared and I felt worthless,
although I told myself that I was still an attractive woman, that there
was no need to fel sexually inadequate."

"So it's the sex thing again!"  Sam said with exasperation.

"I thought we'd settled that!"

"It's not sex that's the, problem it's what you demonstrate during
sex!"  Clare's cry was from the heart.

"A sexual reltionship isn't separated from the rest of reality, Sam. It
never once occurred to you that you might be an ignorant, selfish,
lousy lover.  It was arrogant of you to assume that I was inadequate!
Deep down, you still don't think I'm a normal woman!  You're still
afraid of any attack on your divine male right to know everything there
is to know about sex."  Sam realized that, for the first time, Clare
was yelling at him instead of building up a silent volcano of
resentment. He wasn't sure what to do: he didn't want to go over all
that again. On the other hand, Clare was finally able to express her
anger clearly to the person who had caused it.

Sam knew better than to interrupt her flow.

"... And while we're talking about the man's divine right to know,
little babies are born knowing all they need to know about love:
they're unselfconscious, they can communicate, and their first
experience sucking is a sensual one!  But by the time a baby boy grows
up, his head has been stuffed with myths and taboos, and the idea that
in sexual matters, the man always knows best!"

Sam looked suitably unsure.

-"Clare paused, then shook her head wearily.

"There's no the things I t in this, Sam.  You've never listened to even
when something is an obvious fact, you say, and never quite seem to
believe me, or to trust me.  You're too trapped in your own ego to be
able to hear or to understand."

"They should teach a guy these things at school," Sam said lamely, as
he was clearly expected to make some response.

"Please believe me, Clare, I'll do anything to get you back."

"Exactly what do you want to get back?"  Clare asked.

"My wife and my son," Sam said firmly.

"And, of course, your career?"  "Yes."  Sam's last movie, Mainsail, had
performed unimpressively.

"So at last we have the truth!"  Clare shouted.

"You turned up here because you thought I was about to inherit enough
money to stage your movie comeback!"

"That isn't fair, Clare.  Sure, I could use any investment that's
floating around.  Who can't?  I've got an option on a terrific
screenplay.  It's called "Voyage to the Moon".  It's about"

"Get out!"

Sam did not retreat.

"You say that you want total honesty from me, and then you throw me out
when you get it!  You know movies always came first in my life until I
met you.  Now they come second, but I'll admit it's a close second."
Clare wondered why she felt so hurt, when she'd always known the truth.
Sam was a movie creature, first and foremost.  He might say now that he
put his wife and child first; he might even think it.  But the fact was
that ninety nine per cent of his energy, his concentration, his time,
and his money was devoted to his business.  His family got what was
left.

Nam looked again at the dark smudges of exhaustion under Clare's eyes.
He saw how thin she'd become in only four weeks.  He longed to take her
in his arms, but she swiftly dodged around the table to the window so
that the Spanish table was a barrier between them.

"Get out," Clare said again.

The next morning, Buzz sat on a pale blue chair before the window in
Elinor's bedroom.

"Only one visitor at a time, the doctor said," Buzz reminded her
firmly.

"And keep it short.  Remember, you didn't feel too good yesterday.  Ten
minutes each girl and not a second more!  You'll see Miranda first,
then Annabel."

"And Clare?"  Elinor asked.

"Clare's seeing Sam and Josh off for a day on the speedboat.  She'll be
along later."

The day nurse pulled down the cream window blinds against the morning
sun as Miranda entered.

Elinor smiled as she said, "Hello, darling."  She had trouble
pronouncing the words.  She asked anxiously, "Can you hear me properly,
Miranda?"  "Of course she can," Buzz said.

"You sound as if you've got a bit of a toothache, that's all."

After ten minutes of understandably strained, cheerful chat, Buzz
jerked her head towards the door and Miranda quietly disappeared.  She
was replaced by Annabel, who had clearly been crying.

As she talked, Annabel picked up a little box from the bedside table;
it was an antique ebony snuffbox, the lid inlaid with a geometric
pattern-of tortoiseshell and ivory.

"That was the first antique I ever bought," Elinor said.

"Cost tuppence from a junk barrow in Earls Court Road.  Take it now,
dear child, as a gift."  Buzz said sharply, "Annabel!  Put that back!
You ain't dying, Nell, and I won't have you behaving as if you was.,

Annabel jumped and replaced the little box.

"Sorry.  I only fiddling with it."  She had wanted to disguise her
fumbling hands: she was not about to explain to her sick ",irandmother
the reason for her fright, for the panic that rose within her chest.

After Annabel left, Elinor whispered to Buzz, "I want to see Clare
alone."

"Not on your life," said Buzz.

"I'm sticking to you, close a limpet.  You ain't going to overdo it'
today my girl.  Nobody is going to see you alone."

"Please, Buzz," Elinor pleaded.

"I w ant to ask her to go back to Sam."  Buzz hesitated, knowing that
Clare would never discuss this in her presence.  Reluctantly she
nodded.

"Don't forget, 1711 be sitting next door in the library with my
stopwatch."  She marched past Elinor's bed into the library; in front
of the large window that overlooked the sea was the wooden kitchen
table upon which Elinor had written Deadly Fortune and her every book
since.

From the window, Buzz could see Clare sunning herself on the terrace
below.

"Okay, Clare, you can come up now," she yelled.

Two minutes later, Clare stood at her grandmother's bedside; after a
sleepless night, she looked almost as pale and exhausted as Elinor.

Elinor said, "I saw Sam for a few minutes, darling.  He told me you'd
had a serious tiff, but he hopes to persuade you to return to LA."
Clare looked carefully at Elinor.

"Sam only tells people what suits him, Gran."

"He's apparently just flown halfway round the world to -tell you he.
loves you."

"Sam can certainly act the devoted husband," Clare said sourly"

"But if he's flown halfway round the world to tell she he loves me,
then why didn't he tell me he loves meT "Any Don Juan can say he loves
you."  Elinor attempted a smile as she quoted what Buzz had so often
told the girls in years past.

"You have to watch what Sam does, not what he says.  If he gets up in
the middle of the night to fetch you a glass of water, then he loves
you."

"A Busby Berkeley lineup in front of his bed couldn't wake Sam in the
middle of the night," Clare said.

"Gran, I didn't want to tell you, especially now, but you must
understand.  He ... was with somebody else.  That's why I left."

"She probably threw herself at him.  A little tart.  Dearest girl, I've
told you before, you mustn't let a little bit of fluff spoil your
marriage."

"You know, she was only one of them," Clare said, vexed.  it was
typical of Sam's chutzpah to get his story in first, to gain sympathy
and support, to get Gran on his team.

Reluctantly Elinor said, "I had the same problem with Daddy Billy, but
in my day wives had to put up with that sort of thing.  Please be
patient, darling, for Josh's sake as well as your own.  Don't throw
away your marriage because Sam is giving you trouble.  All men give
trouble."  Clare said indignantly, "I really don't want to discuss it,
Gran, but I don't see why I should -put up with my husband's adulteries
just because you did so please don't try to force me!"

"After six years of marriage, Clare, you can't expect the same
relationship as on your wedding day."

"Of course I don't expect the same relationship!"  Clare exclaimed.
What she had expected was a loving and trusting relationship based on a
realistic assessment of each other's virtues and faults.

"Being in love .  Elinor dreamily remembered what it was like to feel
that your lover possessed all the wonderful qualities you wanted,
before you realized that he didn't possess them, and that perhaps you
had forced those qualities on him in the first place.  She shook her
head sadly.

"Being in love isn't being married."  Ib that why you never write about
marriage?"  Clare bitterly.

"Only being in lo veT "There's no need for that tone of voice," Elinor
said, clearly hurt.

"Beige in love isn't a solution to every female problem!"  Clare
cried.

"I've never seen that spelled out in a women's magazine story, or a
film, or ... a novel."  Clare was prepared to do without the ups of
being in love in return for never experiencing the downs.  She never
again wanted to experience the feeling of being out of control and
dependent on someone else's approval, at someone else's mercy.  She
never again wanted to feel that someone else could send her to heaven
or to hell.  She never again wanted to experience that feeling which
led women to do too much for, and demand too much from, a partner.

"Understandably, you're feeling cynical because of Sam's naughtiness..
."

"Gran, he's not some mischievous schoolboy."  Last night, Sam had tried
to manipulate Clare, and now her grandmother was trying to do the same
thing on his behalf.

For.  the second time in twenty-four hours, Clare's indignation
overcame her caution.  Having come to terms with the failure of her
marriage, she was trying to pick up the broken bits of her pride, glue
them together, and get on with her life.  She wished that people would
not interfere, would leave her alone, especially people who didn't know
all the facts.

"Why not try to look upon whatever happened as a little misdemeanour,"
Elinor persisted.

"Sam loves you.  You know he does.  And love is important because you
can't live without it, dear child: without love, you only exist."

"I'm not sure that I love Sam.  And I can live without love!  Lots of
people do nuns and light housemen for a start," Clare raged.

"You taught me that without a man a woman's life is bleak, empty, and
dangerous; you taught me that a woman isn't complete without a man. But
I wonder if that's so.  I felt inadequate because I was living with a
man."  Elinor whispered, "Don't throw away your marriage, Clare.  No
woman wants to live without love and romance that's what makes a woman
feel transformed ... excited ... attractive .. . alive.  That's what
I've always tried to convey in my writing."

"Romance has a bad influence on reality," Clare said.

"You encourage your readers to believe that one day their prince will
come."

"What's wrong with th at?"  "What's wrong is that he won't!  He will
only ever be a paper prince on a paper page!  You should have shown
your readers that there isn't a Prince Charming, so they won't feel
disappointed and heated if their prince turns into a frog, like mine
did.  The story Sam tells about the frog is sad because it's true ..

"The story about the frog?"

"It's not As silly as it sounds.  A frog asked a princess to take him
to bed with her so that he could turn into a fairy prince.  But when
she woke up in the morning, the frog was still a frog.  He croaked,
"Sorry to disappoint you, but princesses always fall for that line.""
Elinor was silent as she allowed herself to see, for once, the soft and
gentle cobweb of romance she had carefully woven around her life with
Billy.  Quietly she asked, "Is it so terrible to let an unhappy or
humiliated woman forget, for a few hours, the problems that she will
probably have to put up with for her whole life?"  Elinor believed that
her novels provided her readers with excitement, helped them to escape
from insecurity and anxiety, frustration and drudgery, misery and
sorrow, and of course, the boring daily routine of a life in which
nothing was likely to change.

3o6 Clare sighed.

"You shouldn't encourage your readers to Think that their lives might
turn out like your novels.  You encourage them to turn to romance
rather than face reality.  And then they're at a disadvantage when they
have to deal with real life problems."  Her voice rose.

"Clare, you're getting overexcited."  Elinor's own voice had weakened
to a whisper.  Clare suddenly noticed that Elinor's hands were gripping
the bedclothes, betraying the emotion hidden by her quiet words.  In
trying to articulate what she felt so strongly, Clare had forgotten
that, she was talking to a very sick woman.

"I'm sorry, Gran.  I hadn't planned to talk about this today.  But you
know it's what I've always thought.  And it doesn't meant that I don't
love you."  Elinor was not mollified.  She said sharply, "My romantic
novels enabled you girls to have a carefree life, the sort of life I
wish I'd been able to give your father."  Elinor waited for the apology
she felt was due" from Clare.  After a few moments of uncomfortable
silence, she said stubbornly, "If you denigrate my life's work, you
shall not profit by it unless you apologize to me, Clare."  With an
effort, Clare spoke softly.

"Gran, I don't want to denigrate your life's work.  And I don't want to
talk about money.  That's not important, Gran" "Are you going to
apologize to me or not?"  Elinor demanded in a shaking voice.  She
thought that Clare was being contemptuous of all she had done for her.
In fact, Clare had been going to say that Elinor's health was what was
important at the moment.

Buzz strode in from the library.

"Your ten minutes was up half an hour ago, Clare.  And if I'd known
there would be raised voices, I wouldn't have let you inhere."  Clare's
visit with Elinor was abruptly terminated.

Furious at the angry words, Clare telephoned Thomas Cook in Nice for
tickets to London.  She wasn't going back to LA and she wasn't staying
here.  She would take Josh and Kathy, go to cosy, comfortable London,
where she knew so many people, and there she would sort out her life.

Miranda, wearing a green bikini, sunned herself on the south terrace.
As she listened to the faint smack of the sea on the rocks below, she
thought again, regretfully, of Angus.  She had to face the fact that
she still missed him.

Although she'd seen a couple of nice men recently, when it came to the
heavy breathing Miranda found that she didn't want to be touched
intimately by anyone she didn't know well.  She didn't feel comfortable
and safe with anybody but Angus: he hadn't tried to push her into bed
at the first opportunity.

Three weeks earlier, her secretary had unexpectedly announced Mr. Angus
Maclayne on line three.  Miranda's heart had looped the loop as she
happily accepted an invitation to lunch at Rules, his favourite
restaurant.  She hoped Angus wanted to rekindle their love affair, as
she did.

Rules was decorated like a Victorian library; it smelled of superior
malt whiskies and very old leather.  Miranda and Angus sat in a
velvet-lined, crimson booth that reminded her of an old-fashioned
railway carriage.  The Dickensian waiter flapped his napkin and advised
with more truth than tact, "Shouldn't have turbot today, sir, although
the salmon's passable."  They ordered vichyssoise, followed by sea bass
with fresh peas, and iced apricot souffle afterwards.

There had been no expression of undying love on the angular face she
had come to love.  Instead, Angus treated Miranda with distant respect,
twitching his sandy eyebrows and speaking of inconsequential things
just as though she were his aunt ... or maybe his stockbroker.

Once during lunch, she thought for a moment her hopes 3o8 lized.  Over
the sea bass, Angus leaned across -would be rea white linen tablecloth,
his lips close to her ear.

"Miranda, I've been thinking a lot about you."  Miranda smiled
encouragingly.  She longed to hear him say, "God, how I've missed you!
Let's get out of here, darling!  I want to be alone with you!"

Angus said, "I'm worried that you're expanding too fast.  You seem to
be financing yourself by borrowing against your leases leveraging in an
expanding property market while interest rates are low."  Miranda felt
her heart crash to the bottom of her ribcage.

"What's wrong with that?"  she muttered.  Angus carefully dissected his
fish.

"If this property boom suddenly collapses, or if the government decides
to jack up the bank rate to curb consumer spending, then you might find
your loans withdrawn, in which case you'd have a serious cash-flow
problem on your hands."

"I appreciate your concern," Miranda said crossly.

"Higher bank interest may also mean a property slump," Angus added.

"And then you'd have another big problem: the leases that.  act as your
collateral would sink in value, so the banks would run scared and ask
for fast repayment."  Angus sipped his hock reflectively.

"That sort of situation has been known to end in ... bankruptcy."

"Thanks for warning me, but I have no intention of going bankrupt,"
Miranda replied coldly; she was too disappointed to enjoy the apricot
souffle.  For the remainder of the meal, they chatted politely about
business and exchanged city gossip.  Afterwards, they parted awkwardly
on the pavement, each refusing the other's offer of a lift.

Neither suggested a further meeting.  Angus, who admired guts and
gumption, had missed the adventurous and spirited Miranda even more
than he expected.  He asked her out to lunch because he hoped that she
had missed him.  He had kept a discreet close watch on Miranda, who,
he knew, had not been seriously involved with any other man since she
broke off their engagement.  Angus reckoned that fast business
expansion was absorbing all her time and energy, which was why he had
decided to take things one step at a time and discuss only business
over luncheon; a business chat would avoid putting either of them in a
rejecting position.

Sadly, Miranda, too, had clearly wished to discuss only business.

However, Angus did not intend to give up his pursuit of her; she
fascinated him as no other woman had.  Sometimes she was fiery, or she
could be ice cool: qualities that intrigued the male in Angus, although
they disturbed the businessman.

CHAPTER16

TUESDAY, 20 JULY 1965

Miranda lay half asleep on a sofa in front of her sitting room window,
which looked down on the Place de la Republique; from there, the road
led to the distant perfume factory which Miranda wanted to buy.  It had
been built in the depression of 1870 when most villagers were out of
work by the Countess of Saracen, whose birthday was still celebrated,
and a mass said for her soul in the local Church of St.  Peter.

Miranda was startled by a knock on the door.  She called, "Entrez," and
then said, "Oh, it's you, Adam."

"May I come in?"  "Sure.  I've finished my siesta."  Miranda yawned,
stretched, and wriggled her bare, brown toes.  She was wearing an
emerald silk shirt and bikini.

"I see an old friend."  Adam pointed to a framed cartoon, which he had
given her the previous Christmas: a startled businessman gazed at a
ghost; rising from his desk drawer, it said, "I am the spirit of old
notes to yourself."

"You hit home with that one."  Miranda yawned again; "What do you
want?" She rubbed her stiff neck.

"Big miv.  take to go to sleep on the couch."

"I can fix a stiff neck in no time," Adam offered.  I learned massage
at the gym.  Lie flat on the floor."

"Okay."  Another yawn.

"Shirt on or off?"  "Oh, keep it on."  Miranda lay on her stomach on
the kilim rug; it was patterned in ochre and the same faded blue as
Adam's flared jeans and shirt.

Adam knelt behind her head and started to massage her shoulders. After
ten minutes, Miranda's neck ache had vanished: she lay on the rug, her
eyes shut; she felt boneless and sleepy.

Adam's voice was quiet and firm.

"Your body is getting lighter and lighter ... You feel light enough to
float on a cloud .. . When I count to ten, you will relax..  ." 
Miranda thought, Why, he's hypnotizing me, and then floated to sleep.

She woke to see Adam lying with his legs up, on the sofa, reading Paris
Match.  Miranda looked at her watch.

"I've been asleep almost an hour.  You did a great job.  I feel as
boneless as a squid."

"You were very tired," Adam said, "and we've all been worried about
Elinor."

"Yes."  Miranda's face crumpled and she started to weep.  She rubbed
both eyes, then winced as, too late, she remembered her contact lenses.
She edged them out and scrambled to her feet.

"I can't think why I'm crying."

"A natural reaction, after this strain and anxiety," Adam said
reassuringly.  He watched her, his head to one side, as if undecided.
He stood up.  He moved towards her.

"Don't worry.  I'm in control of everything.  You can relax now."
Miranda sniffled- She felt the flimsy cotton of Adam's shirt against
her as muscular arms wrapped around her.  Her body relaxed and she
leaned her head against -his strong chest.  She felt his hand beneath
her shirt; his thumb pressed along her naked backbone all the way to
the nape of her neck.

Each time Adam gently pressed against a vertebra, Miranda was pusfied
against his body.  She could feel his flat, muscular strength: she
could also feel his arousal as Adam kissed her firmly on the mouth.

Long ago, Miranda had realized that sexual involvement with Adam could
only complicate her life, but she had been only half awake and off
guard when he made his ya ove  Rebelliously she thought, what the hell.
Why 3houldn't I forget business just for once?  And why shouldn't I do
as I please with my own body?  In silence, Adam lifted her into his
arms and carried her five feet nine and no lightweight on to the bed.
Miranda's hair flamed against the pillow as she lay back with her eyes
closed, thinking, Too late to stop him now.  And I don't want to.

Almost motionless, she lay in a trance of sensuality, Adam's mouth
against the soft skin' of her breasts.  He whispered, "Keep your eyes
closed.  You're not to move.

Here, I'm in charge."

"But don't you want me to "I want you to lie still and let me ... love
you."  Miranda felt a melting and tickling inside her stomach as if
someone was stroking it with a feather.  Her body relaxed in Adam's
strong and clearly skilled hands as he stroked her bare, smooth belly,
and a warm glow spread from her navel over her entire body.  His mouth
warmed her as his lips travelled slowly downward from her breasts.

Sometime later, Miranda said, "But you haven't."

"There's plenty of time," Adam said.  V like to do things to a woman. I
get my pleasure from seeing you climax."  She had thrashed around like
a freshly caught trout on a grassy bank.

"I told you, you're not to move."  Adam firmly replaced her arm on the
pillow.

"And what if I doT "I'll tie you to the bed."  Miranda opened her
eyes.

"Bondage?  How sleazy."

"Not if it's playful," Adam promised.

"I'd blindfold you with a silken scarf and tie your wrists and ankles
to the bedpost with silken ribbons."

"I'd bite them off!"

"I was only joking," Adam murmured, feeling again for her breasts.

An hour later, Miranda, lying on top of Adam's suntanned, naked body,
said sleepily, "That was a big surprise."

"I've been wanting to do it for years."

"Why did you wait so long?"

"The same reason as you.  Prudence.  But nobody could feel platonic
about you, Miranda."  Miranda remembered howling as a twelve-year-old
because Adam treated her as a child.  Briefly she wished that child
could have looked into this future.  She said, "I think ... I think
I've always wanted ... this."

"I know I have."  Adam again bent his lips to her breast.

Miranda said sleepily, "I've never had an orgasm during sex like that.
Sometimes I've been on the verge, but then the feeling vanished."

"I have to confess, you're not the first woman I've made love to."
Miranda inhaled the earthy smell of the bed, propped herself on one
elbow, and started gently to scratch Adam's arm with her fingernails,
stroking the sensitive inner flesh, from wrist to elbow.

He shivered with pleasure.

"No woman has ever aroused me as you have."

"You tooT "I've never felt like this before, Miranda.  I feel that
we're equals, that you'll never allow me to dominate you.  I suspect
you'll always keep me guessing, keep me on my toes."  Roughly he pulled
her to him.

His kiss was deep and passionate.  Miranda fleetingly wondered how she
could ever have thought that Adam had a withholding, guarded nature.
And then she was drawn again into his spell and she stopped thinking
altogether.

Later, Adam lazily stared past Miranda to the windows twin rectangles
of blue sky, between which hung an old r in an elaborately carved
mahogany frame.  The sil-ver cd glass was faintly green in places and
speckled black where the silver had flaked off the back.  Beneath this
mirror stood Miranda's surprisingly feminine dressing table, skirted in
spotted white muslin frills.

Adam said, "I'm surprised to find your dressing table looks like
Scarlett O'Hara's under drawers."

"Sometimes a frill is just a frill."  Miranda shrugged.

"My clever darling," Adam murmured.

Miranda stretched voluptuously.

"Annabel and Clare are going to get the surprise of their lives when we
tell them about us!"

"I'd prefer to keep our secret to ourselves for a bit," Adam said
firmly.

"I have to settle Elinor's affairs.  I don't want anyone to suspect
that I favour you over your sisters, which is something they already
fear because of our business connection."  He did not mention his other
reason for secrecy, although they both knew it.  Everyone close to her
knew that Elinor's unspoken dream was that Miranda her only remaining
unmarried granddaughter should marry into the British aristocracy.
While Elinor lived, Adam dared not risk flinging a monkey wrench into
that dream.

At eleven o'clock the following morning, Buzz sat down on the blue
chair by Elinor's bedroom window, pulled the kitchen timer from the
pocket of her navy cotton dress, and set it to twenty minutes: the
mechanism began to tick in an irritating way.

Elinor, in a cream silk bed jacket was propped up by a stack of frilly
pillows; she looked old and frail.

Elinor's cat, Fudge, now allowed back into the bedroom, padded to the
grey sofa in front of the fireplace, where Adam sat, and rubbed against
his jeans.

"Cats always like me."  Adam leaned down and stroked the pale ginger
fur; the cat curled up against his feet and went to sleep.  From the
briefcase that lay open at his side, Adam extracted a document.  He
spoke briskly.

"Before I return to London, I'd like to propose a strategy, should
Elinor ever again be ill, to prevent the problems that Buzz has
experienced during the past few weeks."  Because nobody had been
empowered to sign cheques on Elinor's behalf, no household bills or
salaries could be paid: for three weeks, the servants" wages had been
paid by Buzz from her own bank account.

"If, for any reason, Elinor can't sign cheques, then I suggest I sign
them for her," Adam said.

Buzz looked up sharply.  Adam continued, "But I would be empowered to
draw only on Elinor's housekeeping account in Nice.  The power of
attorney would specifically state that no cheques could be made out to
me or the firm.  We would wait for any payment until Elinor was well
again."

"Why not have two signatures required?"  Buzz suggested.

"One of the other STG partners, perhaps?"  "Certainly."  Adam nodded,
then turned to Elinor.

"And the STG professional insurance would automatically cover
malpractice."  Elinor looked at Buzz.

"That okay with you?  Yes.  Then please do it, Adam dear."  Her voice
was feeble.

After Elinor signed and the document was witnessed, Adam produced a
second sheet of paper.  He said, "In order to prevent literary
contracts being held up, I also suggest that a general power of
attorney be given to me again only in a limited area and only to be
used if Elinor be indisposed."  Buzz asked, "Is that also covered by
the malpractice insurance?"  "Yes," Adam said.

"Incidentally, if I deliberately breached a power of attorney and
exploited it for my own benefitili enough I can't think how that would
be possible I o d be struck off the Roll of Solicitors by the Law
Society."

"That all right with you, Buzz?"  Elinor asked faintly.

"Do you have any specific objections, Buzz?"  Adam inquired politely.

After a moment, Buzz shook her head.  These powers of attorney were
only for day-to-day transactions.  If Buzz protested without cause, it
might even sound fishy as if she wanted to control Nell's money.

"Then I also agree to that," Elinor said.

WEDNESDAY, 21 JULY 1965 At five p.m."  Scott finished his coverage of
the anti Vietnam War demonstrators.  In the newsroom, reporters hung
around drinking coffee as they read or talked.  Desks were littered
with yards of wire stories, celebrity bulletins, picture handouts,
telephone messages, and empty coffee cups.  In the background, teletype
machines clacked and a bank of television monitors showed different
pictures, some of which were material being fed through to the station.
Somebody wailed, "You mean after two lawyers passed this, I still can't
run it?  In the news editor's office, an assistant was reading the Est
of stories from her scratch pad, "Report from Washington on the senator
bribe story.  The mayor of New York and the anti-war demonstrations. 
We have the mayor bugging out on this, Scott."

A head poked around the door.

"Call to Europe in your office, Scott."

"Sorry, you guys."  Scott hurried to his office and carefully closed
the door.

"Annabel?  What's happened, darling?"

"Scott ... I miss your "I miss you too, angel."

"Ineedyou here."  Scott was sensitive to the pressure his wife had
been under for the past month.  First she'd learned that her
grandmother, whom she adored, was dangerously ill, and had been at her
bedside ever since.  Then her contract had not been renewed.  This was
a double-barrel blow for both of them in terms of loss of money and
prestige.  The humiliation was worse because it was so public, and it
was a good thing that Annabel had not been in New York when the news
broke, when gloating gossip writers had jammed Scott and Annabel's home
phones with their venomous questions.

Scott knew that Annabel was now facing the worst moment any model can
face: she was officially over the hill, gaining weight, losing her
looks and on the downward path to wrinkles and sag.  No reassurances
from Scott had been able to lull his twenty-five-year-old wife's
anxiety about her fading beauty.  It was ludicrous to be so young and
yet a has-been.

Scott tried to handle her diplomatically.

"Angel, I wish I could be with you, but we both know I can't.  We've
talked about this so often: you know I want to be supportive, but I
also have to do my job properly.  We're short-staffed here the summer
holiday period's started and everyone's stretched.  I can't just walk
out.  If I'd come when you first asked me, I might have been in Saracen
for an entire month: I'd probably have no job to come back to."  Gently
he added, "And what use would I have been, angel?"

Once again Scott felt that she was asking for something unreasonable,
something a child might ask of a parent.  He wished Annabel were not so
insecure and dependent upon him; for the past few months, as she waited
for Avanti to make up its mind, she had needed constant emotional
support and reassurance from Scott, who had felt her clinging to him,
almost like a physical weight on his back.

P8

"I wanted you with me," Annabel wept.  She had forgotten t she
telephoned to tell Scott the news of the trust.

"My job means having to give up a lot of things that everyone else
takes for granted in their life, and you've always known that,
Annabel," Scott again reminded her.

"Your job seems to suck up your entire life," Annabel sobbed
reproachfully.

"Yes, that's why I married you.  Because I love you, and I want what
little private life I have to, be steady and permanent," Scott said.

"You're so involved with your precious career that you put it before
your private life," Annabel retorted.

"You put us on the back burner you'll deal with it next week, next
month you'll do that until you retire!"

"My career i .s precious to me and you knew that when you married me.
It's not as if I worked for a large network news show.  You know that
everyone here does the job of at least two people.  How would it look
if I suddenly disappeared for weeks leaving a gap that other people
would have to fill because my wife's grandmother is ill on the other
side of the world?"  "Please come, Scott "It's not necessary.  I can't
walk out on everyone here.  Please try to understand that, angel."

"Scott, I want to hold you ... It's been months since we were in bed
together.  Don't you remember how good it used to beT "Nobody gets the
honeymoon treatment for ever, angel.  That sort of
twenty-four-hours-in-bed passion changes into a different sort of
comfortable, caring love."

Annabel wailed, "You mean I don't attract you any more?  You don't love
me?"

Exasperated, Scott said, "You've become spoiled, neurotic, overanxious,
and self-absorbed.  What's so lovable about that, Anna belT Scott's
office door burst open.

"You're wanted i1i the cutting room."  "Thanks, I'll be right along!"
To Annabel, Scott said carefully, "You just have to tough it out,
angel.  These situations sometimes happen in life."

"That's not all."  Annabel gulped, then managed to say, "I think I'm
having a heart attack."

"What!"

After he calmed down, Scott reasoned that if Annabel were having a
heart attack, she wouldn't be able to talk on the telephone. Cautiously
he said, "Why do you think that, an gelT "My heart is thumping!  I
can't breathe properly 11 In gasping for air!"

"It might be another anxiety attack."  Scott suggested gently.

Annabel said in an agitated voice, "I feel as if my mind is whirling
madly, like a hurricane.  I can't control it.  I feel taut and tense.
I'm literally shaking!"  "Are you sweating?  Are you hands clammY?  Is
your stomach knott ed?"  "Yes," Annabel wept.

It was another panic attack.  Scott said, "Is Adam Still around?  Get
him to the Phone, darling."

Another head appeared around Scott's door.

"They can't cut until you're on the spot, Scott., Scott nearly Said,
"My wife is ill," but he had cried wolf too often: other people's wives
didn't telephone the station as relentlessly as Annabel.

Eventually Scott heard Adam's faint but reassuringly calm voice.

"Anything I can do to help, Scott?  Annabel seems upset.  We thought
she'd gone to bed.  It's nearly midnight here."

"Annabel thinks she's having a heart attack," Scott told him.

"I don't think so," Adam said firmly.

"I'll take her to nor's night nurse immediately I expect she'll give
Annabel something to calm her down.  The situation here has been very
tense.  It's understandable that Annabel is a little ... overwrought."
Scott thought, He's telling me that she's hysterical.  He$aid, "Tell me
straight, Adam.  Just answer yes or no.  Does, "Annabel look ill to
you?"  No "I'm between a rock and a hard place.  Of course I'll fly
over straight away if Elinor..

"There is no necessity to do so."  Adam spoke firmly again.

"Elinor is progressing well, and I have everything under control
here."

"I'm sure you have," Scott said with great relief.

WEDNESDAY, 28 JULY 1965

A week later, just before her luncheon was served, Adamtook the trust
documentation to Elinor's bedroom to be signed.

As he laid the twenty-four-page Declaration of Trust before her, Adam
said, "There are no changes, but one alteration.  As Paul is to be the
protector, the STG partners think it best to have trustees outside the
firm, so we'll arrange that through the group of accountants we deal
with in Bermuda."

"Did you ask Clare once mo re?"  Elinor, looking frail, was not
interested in the fine points of the trust.

"Yes.  I'm afraid she's still adamant."  Elinor thought for a minute.
With an effort, she lifted her head.

"Remember that I don't want Clare to know she's included in the trust
until she apologizes!  She is not to think she can get away with
behaving hurt fully  Now, where do I sign this thing?  You'd better
call Buzz and that sour-looking nurse to witness it."

At seven4 twenty that same morning, Scott had been at the site of an
unusual hit-and-run story: two older men had been killed and another
injured by a police patrol car.  At midday, Scott returned to the
studio with twenty minutes of film footage, which would be edited to
two minutes plus.  It looked as if it would end up their lead story.

The news editor suggested, "Let's team it with this other hit-and-run
story that's just come in: two black kids, in a car out of control, ran
over four children, who were hurt but not badly.  The black kids have
been paraded in handcuffs to the press."  Scott was interested.

"The cops suspected of killing the two old guys have been suspended but
not arrested, even though I'm told there's a suspicion that murder is
involved.  But the DA's office says they can't pin it on them yet.  So
let's run the story "Why the delay at the DA's office?""

The door opened.

"Call from Europe for you, Scott."  Scott said nothing.  What could he
say?  The entire station knew about his spoiled child bride.  He
hurried to his office.  Once again he listened calmly to her tearful
pleas, and once again Scott refused to walk out on the station and join
Annabel.

That evening, Scott took his place at the news desk and ran an eye over
his script.  Just before airtime, a story had come in on a drug bust:
space was hastily made for this.

At one minute to air, Scott grinned across to the other newscaster,
looked up at the control room, and nodded.

The stress level in the newsroom was high.  There was no noise
whatsoever.  Control said, "Roll feed one ..."  The floor manager
pointed at camera two and counted down: "Four, three, two, one.  Cue
Scott."  A red light flicked on camera two as the floor manager
silently pointed to it.

"Good evening.  I'm Scott Svenson with tonight's news."  Even while the
show was going out, work continued in the newsroom.  Reporters handed
their just completed text edited the stories and telephoned news
editor, who alterations in the programme to the newscaster: "Scott,
story four from Moscow something better's come in, "t going to run it"
"Scott, hold item seven, so we aren medical malpractice, for later in
the show.  The guy's just died, so we must update it."

As the camera pulled back on the last shot and credits shown on the
screen, the tension in the studio relaxed, la by an exultant mood.  The
interrupter-feedback button in Scott's ear said, "Nice work, Scott. 
Now beat it to your office.  Long-distance call from Europe."  Scott
tore off his mike thinking, It must be five in the ""morning in France.
 He ran to his office and lifted the phone.

"Annabel?  What's happen ed?"

Annabel could hardly speak through her tears.

"Gran bad a relapse four hours ago.  Adam is here to speak with you if
you don't believe me.  They say there's no point in moving her to a
hospital.  Now you've got to come, Scott."

CHAPTER17

MONDAY, 11 OCTOBER 1965

Ten weeks later, the ambulance team that had driven Elinor from the
Nice hospital carried her into the chiteau and up to her bedroom.

Elinor, her arms draped around the necks of two paramedics, said, "You
can take that thing right away!"  She meant the wheelchair waiting in
her bedroom.

"Please," Buzz pleaded.

"You gotta be careful for a bit, Elinor.  You gave us such a fright. We
thought you was a goner."

"Well, I feel fine now," Elinor said.

"Where's that bottle of champagne you promised me?"

The specialists had said that if she was careful, she could five a long
time.  Her doctor had told her that she had completely recovered.  He
saw no reason to add that from now on, her body would break down: she
would gradually become slower in her movements, she would tire more
easily and lack stamina, and she would probably have another stroke in
seven years" time at the latest.

TUESDAY, 12 OCTOBER 1905

In the grey morning light, Clare, still in her nightgown, stooped to
pick up the little bottle of sleeping pills from the floor.  She shook
it.  Empty.  Better get another prescription.  Careful not to wake Josh
in the back room, Clare pulled on her dressing gown.

Josh was still bewildered by the sudden change in living standard from
California sun and the constant care of I Kathy now working for another
family in nearby ark ham Square to the stuffy flat in Pimlico where his
babysitter, Mrs.  Gooden, a retired cook, watched over Josh and her
other six little charges, one of whom always seemed to be bare-bottom
cd and on the potty.

Clare hurried to the kitchenette to make Josh's breakfast.  Their
basement apartment cost more than she could afford, but at least she
felt at home in Chelsea.

Once again she wished she understood what had happened to her in the
last three months.  She had such a strong sense of being in the right,
of having behaved in a morally correct manner.  Why then had she ended
up in such a mess?

After Clare's sudden departure from Saracen, Miranda had immediately
located her through friends, then telephoned and urged her sister to be
sensible and apologize to Elinor, "because we all know you really love
Gran'.

"Of course I do, Miranda," Clare had said.

"But that's beside the point."  She was determined to allow nobody to
treat her as a child in future not Sam, not Adam, not Elinor, not Buzz,
and certainly not Miranda.

"This tiff is escalating to a ridiculous degree!"  Miranda exploded.

"Adam says the trust is going to be irrevocable, so for heaven's sake,
think ahead, for when Joshua goes to Eton -"

"I don't think I'm being ridiculous.  I hope Josh never goes to Eton,
or any other privileged school where he's kept away from reality,"
Clare said stiffly.  Correctly feeling that Miranda thought she was
being tiresome, she added, "What counts in this tiff as you call it is
the principle of the thing."  Miranda said, "People only say that when
they can't think of any other reason for doing something damned
stupid."

Clare was impatient to hang up.  Enraged, Miranda said, "Okay, I can
take a hint."  She promised herself she wouldn't approach Clare
again.

At first Clare kept in touch with Annabel after her sister returned to
New York, but as her own life became increasingly difficult, she found
herself unable to write the sort of letter that would prop up Annabel's
crumbling self-esteem.

Via his lawyer, Sam refused to give Clare money because he didn't want
a divorce.  He wanted his wife and child back, and he reckoned he could
tough it out longer than she could.

Clare's solicitor explained to her that men often forced their wives to
return by refusing to grant a divorce and making it difficult for them
to obtain money even when it was awarded by a court.  He said that
returning to Sam might be best for her and her child.  Clare wondered
whose side her lawyer was on.  She was clearly and legally in the
right; she wasn't going to be manipulated and brought to heel by lack
of funds.

"I'm damned if I'm going to let him bully me with money!"  Clare
cried.

"I'll earn my own.  money!"

She soon found out how difficult this was.  Clare fell into the poverty
trap experienced in the sixties by many single mothers.  Because she
had no man, she had no income beyond what she could earn.  And because
she had no training, she had no saleable skills.  She could only get a
poorly paid job as a sales assistant in a King's Road shoe boutique.

Because she had no man, Clare also suddenly found she had no public
identity and was not likely to get asked to dinner parties, for society
seemed to move only in couples.  A full-time job, a small child, and no
home help left her little energy for dinner parties anyway.  And she
was too proud to accept hospitality when she couldn't afford to return
it.  She, who had always helped lame dogs, now the many helping hands
that were held out to her, use they only hauled her back, temporarily,
into a life comfort from which she would later have to return to
"Icality.  She became abrupt and ill at case with her friends, Vho
sensed this.  Eventually they stopped trying.

Clare was surprised to find how much money it cost to cad what she
considered a normal life.  She earned eighteen unds a week after tax.
Her rent was ten pounds a week, To d the babysitter cost a pound a day,
which left three W pounds to live on -just enough to pay her grocery
bill.  She didn't know how to budget or how to keep track of her
expenditures, and she cried every time she opened her bank statement.

Apart from basic necessities, any other purchase was clearly now an
extravagance for Clare.  Her wages only just paid for her expenses: now
a taxi was a memory.

Bewildered, Clare did not understand why she couldn't manage.  What was
she doing wrong?  The other assistants in the shoe shop seemed to
manage on their wages, Of course, none.  of them was supporting a
child, and the male assistant got sixty per cent more than the women.
And she was living in an area of London that was relatively expensive,
while her new peers lived in Battersea and Wandsworth.

But Clare was not yet accustomed to a LIFE in which ice cream, sherry,
and a telephone were luxuries.  So she economized by drinking cheap
cooking sherry.  She felt humiliated by her.  poverty especially when
the telephone was cut off for non-payment and she had to confess this
to Gilda, the senior assistant in the shoe shop.

"Poor?  You ain't poor, Clare," scoffed Gilda during their tea break.
She lit up a Woodbine and puffed on it serenely.

"Poor people don't have bank accounts and refrigerators and money for
the launderette."

"I'm starting to realize that," Clare said humbly.

"But i still need more money than I'm earning, to look after Josh."

Clare had not wanted- to leave Josh who would be three in December
with a-babysitter, but she found that none of the local nursery
schools, public or private, had an available slot.

When she tried to get Josh into a free day nursery, she discovered that
the local authority did not regard her situation as difficult.

"Difficult" seemed to mean that your pimp had beaten you up and thrown
you out, and you had no money for a fix and couldn't stand up until
you'd had one.  In the Chelsea library, Clare read the 1944 Education
Act, Section 82 6. It said that a local education authority 'shall, in
particular, have regard to the need for securing that provision is made
for pupils who have not attained the age of five years by the provision
of nursery school."  So where were the nursery schools?  Clare felt
protest rise within her.  She was determined not to.  be bludgeoned
into submission by lack of money and a system that seemed not to care
for mothers and children.

The following weekend, Clare sold all her jewellery except her
engagement and wedding rings.  She accepted the first price offered by
the first jeweller, not realizing that she could probably have raised
fifty per cent more money by bargaining or trying other shops.

That night, as often when she put Josh to bed, Clare held the most
precious thing in her world close to her heart and felt guilty and
ashamed that she wasn't providing him with the things she thought she
should.  She lived with guilt even as she fiercely told herself that it
wasn't fair that her life now should be so miserable and exhausting.

Josh had to be squeezed into Clare's tight weekday schcdule: after
taking him to the babysitter in Pimlico, she caught another bus to the
shoe shop where she worked.  Lunch hour meant a hurried visit to a
launderette or one of the new supermarkets.  At six o'clock, Clare
again caught the to Pimlico, took Josh back to her basement, cooked
supper, cooked her supper increasingly, the same ry food sufficed for
both, put Josh to bed, had a looked over any paperwork required by her
solicitor, aw led into bed with a book, fell asleep after reading a
-page, and woke two hours later, unable to get back to Acep.  Insomnia
plagued her and sapped her strength.  Exhausted and without much hope
for the future, she gradually slipped into a permanent state of
depresion, which made life even more difficult for Josh, although
neither of them realized this.

Thankfully, at weekends, Clare felt almost normal again.  On Saturdays,
she stayed in bed late although as Josh bounced up and down beside her,
it wasn't a very restful experience.  But she didn't mind as she
cuddled his warm little body next to hers, played hide-and-seek under
the bedclothes, or read aloud to him.  Later, soaping her soWs slippery
body in the bath as he wriggled from her grasp and splashed water up at
his mother, Clare would again feel happy.

On Saturday afternoons, Clare pushed Josh's collapsible canvas pram up
Sloane Street towards Kensington Gardens" where she mixed happily with
other children and.  working mothers.  They were all sniffed at by the
uniformed nannies, who wheeled old-fashioned perambulators rather than
the canvas collapsibles.

On Sunday mornings, Clare and Josh went to Mrs.  Gooden's.  Here Clare
who could cook a hamburger but not much else learned to prepare a
traditional British lunch of roast meat and vegetables, followed by a
fruit pie or tart.

"You've got light fingers," Mrs.  Gooden said approvingly one Sunday as
she watched Clare, with the tips of her fingers, mix flour and lard in
the big yellow mixing bowl.

"We'll make a baker of you yet."

Shortly after this, Clare started to swap babysitting evenings with
Stephanie, a mother who also took her small son to Mrs.  Gooden.  This
arrangement ensured that, once a week, both women had an evening and a
night off, followed by a leisurely rise the next morning.

On Clare's first such evening off, she went to a dinner party given by
an old schoolfriend who persisted in keeping in touch.  Clare's partner
was a just-divorced man who talked endlessly about 'that bitch who
needn't think she has a free meal ticket for life', then took Clare to
dance at Annabel's, London's most expensive new nightclub.  He tore her
dress on the taxi journey back to her flat, and after a tussle,
finally, standing on the pavement at three a.m. he realized that she
really wouldn't allow him in.  The following morning, Clare arrived
late for work When Gilda heard what happened, she said, "A man who's
just staggered out of nasty relationship wants a bloody nursemaid at
first, and then he wants to play the field for a bit.  But what he
really wants is another relationship."  Clare said, V don't want
another relationship until I've struggled free of this one."

"Maybe you ought to play the field a bit," Gilda suggested.

"That's what my solicitor's afraid of," Clare said.

"He says it would ruin my case.  He'd like to shut me up in a box for
the next two years.  But Sam can apparently do what the hell he likes,
with as many women as he pleases!"

On her next evening out, Clare remembered Gilda's advice.  Feeling
self-conscious at entering a pub by herself, she slunk into the Markham
Arms, a glamorous tavern in the King's Road where men-about-Chelsea
relaxed in the evening.

Sitting on the next barstool was an antiques dealer called James; he
discussed his feelings with Clare for the next two s and then took her
to dinner at the Ox on the Roof, she chose the most filling dishes,
Eating spaghetti, Oare began to suspect that James would rather talk
about 4 relationship than have one; wolfing bocuf bourgaignon, she
wondered whether James was flaunting his insecurities in order to
attract the maternal feelings he clearly believed nestled within every
woman's breast and from which Clare was trying to escape for the
evening.

By the time the creme brfile was served, she realized that James wasn't
the gentle, sensitive, vulnerable charmer that she had first imagined
but a crashing bore.

Nevertheless, having had far too much to drink, Clare woke up the next
morning in James's bed, saw that it was nearly nine o'clock, fled to
work in her crumpled clothes but arrived late again.  Gilda winked.

The following week, Clare avoided the Markham Arms and went instead to
the Bunch of Grapes in Knightsbridge.  There she met Ian, a fruit
exporter.  Ian was boyish, athletic, charming, and, Clare suspected,
terrified of his fortieth birthday: there had been a bit of the Peter
Pan in Sam, and Clare recognized the symptoms.

During dinner at the Pheasantry, Ian clearly expected Clare to be
frivolously entertaining.  He belittled any attempt at serious
conversation with phrases such as, "Well, you're quite a bluestocking,"
or, "Actually, I didn't come out to discuss politics."

The next morning, Ian woke her up with a cup of tea, said he was sorry
about last night, he'd had a bit too much to drink.  Again Clare was
late to work.

"Of course they both seemed nice guys," Gilda commiserated.

"But they was fake nice guys, pretending to be nice guys.  If you're
going to get picked up in bars and hand it out free on the first date,
you'd better check in regular at St.  Stephen's."

"Is that a church?"

"No, the local clap clinic."  Always, when Clare's hangover subsided,
she wondered why she did it.  She found no sexual pleasure in going to
bed with strangers, but, in contrast with the rest of her week, she was
comforted by the feeling of being thought desirable, of having
someone's arms around her, of warm cuddling beneath the quilt.

One morning, Clare found herself in a rumpled bed in a strange bedroom
with only sixpence in her purse not enough to get to work.  If she was
late for work one more time, she knew, she would be fired.  Clare
panicked and telephoned Miranda.

Wondering whether the prim Miss Goody-Goody of a few months ago had
really metamorphosed into this forlorn and wanton creature, Miranda
said, "I'll send a car for you, straight away."  She hesitated.

"Couldn't we meet, Clare?  ... Won't you let me give you some
money-just to tide you overT "No," Clare lied.

"I have plenty of money at home."

"Gran's worried about you.  We all are."

"How is she?"  Clare asked wistfully.  In the past, when she felt
depressed, she knew that she could always rely on her grandmother to
lift her spirits.

"Gran would feel a lot happier if you paid her a visit.  Couldn't you
fly to the south of France, just for a week?"

"No," Clare said, feeling rage rise.

"I can't take time off."

"How about a better job?"  Miranda suggested.

"You've had experience as a shop assistant, so you could work in one of
our shops.  You'll probably be better paid, and have a better time of
it."

"No.  I want to learn to manage by myself.  Don't worry.  I'll
survive."

"But what about Josh?"  "Josh will have to put up with the life that
his mother can afford to lead."  was fired for turning up late after
she had to wait for her because Josh had a temperature.  As the shop
owner pointed out, it was the third time that month d been late for
work, and if they hadn't needed her to up on time, they wouldn't have
hired her in the first Having decided to start her own nursery play
group sold her engagement ring, a flashy marquise dian in order to buy
the lease of the first floor of a big ward ian house in Pimlico: it
contained a ballroom, a all rear room, and a bathroom.  Clare's
assistants were o other single mothers whose children were also cared
for by Mrs. Gooden.

Mrs.  Gooden lost three kiddies and three pounds a day but, instead,
found herself cooking lunch for thirty-four, a far more lucrative
occupation.  At midday, Mr.  Gooden cycled round to the play group with
lunch hauled behind on a trailer.  He also did Clare's bookkeeping.
Clare doubled her income overnight, and felt that she was doing a

1F

useful job

p In contrast to Clare, her sister Miranda was leading the fast and
frivolous life of the exciting sixties as Britain.  launched into the
first real business boom since Hitler's war.  A rush of stock exchange
takeover bids coined money for shareholders, and Britain imported more
French champagne than any other country, although one in three families
still couldn't afford a TV.

The former aristocratic standards of who and what was acceptable were
now dumped; everyone wanted to belong to the new meritocracy, based not
on birth but on talent, achievement, and the resultant financial reward
the wit hit people, as opposed to the dull, un with-its.

Annabel was painted by David Hockney, and Miranda's portrait a gloomy
study in greys by Brian Kneale was exhibited in the National Portrait
Gallery.  They both wished that Gran would hide her triple portrait:
Annigom was definitely not with it.

Fashion was madly exciting: grannies happily wore miniskirts and
platform thigh boots, while young girls wore button-up granny boots and
Victorian-style, flower-printed dresses.  Females under thirty tried to
look like thumb sucking little girls; with turned-in toes, they skipped
around in buttock-skimming shifts over pale tights.  All females in
their thirties dressed like chic astronauts; all women over forty wore
jaunty, flared trouser suits.

Make-up manufacturers made a fortune.

TUESDAY, I I JANUARY 1966

Snow lay on the park outside as Miranda showed her new house in
Cumberland Terrace to fashion editor Annie Trehearne.  Since the
heating wasn't yet working, the two young women stamped around in
winter coats and boots, and dodged whistling workmen, who no longer
wore baggy dungarees but tight jeans as they 'carried planks from one
room to another.

Annie looked down from the first-floor drawing-room windows to the
gaunt trees of Regent's Park and said, "It's simply super.  Fab.
Smashing.  Let's face it, Miranda, not many people of your age can
afford to buy a house like this.  KITS must be doing ffightfully well."
Miranda nodded.

"But KITS has expanded so fast we're permanently short of capital.  The
money for this place came from a family trust."

"Everyone should have a grandmother like yours.  How is she?"  "The
doctors say she's responding very well to the new treatment, and she
expects to live for another hundred years."  "Glad to hear it."  "N I
wan to know what you think of my new skin owl I t care range," Miranda
said.

"It's targeted at the young twenties and I'm calling it Image.  What do
you think of launching it with pictures of DeneuveT "Pix by Bailey
then.  Expensive," Annie said.  Photographer David Bailey had recently
married French film star Catherine Deneuve, with Mick Jagger as best
man.

"Of course."  Miranda nodded again.

"By the way, how's Annabel enjoying her retirement?"

"Off the record?  Relieved, I think," Miranda reported.  She's neatly
switched to the life of a successful New York hostess she's on every
charity committee in town."  Miranda was not going to let anyone know
that Annabel's self-confidence had been shattered.  It had been painful
to watch her struggle for her self-respect, but she had managed to ward
off the threatened nervous breakdown.  Endless reassurance had been
necessary not of her beauty, for nothing could persuade Annabel that it
had not vanished, but of her value to them all, and of her family's
affection.

Airily Miranda continued, "Annabel's just bought a new apartment.  You
really ought to hop over for a weekend "and see it, Annie.  It's a
penthouse in a high rise on the Upper East Side, with a spectacular
three-sided view over the city and across the river.  It's simply
stunning.  Someone else had practically bought the place, so Annabel
was lucky to get it."

"How did she manage it?  "Simply offered more money.  Adam fixed it."

"That family trust again?  What lucky girls you are!  What news of
ClareT "I don't see much of Clare these days," Miranda said.  il She's
very busy, now that she's running a nursery play" group  She looked
out over the smudged white landscape of Regent's Park, then peered at
the road below.

"Hell, I've just got another parking fine.  Those stupid new meters!
It's getting really difficult to drive in London."

"Or out of it," said Annie.

"Yes.  I was pinched for dangerous driving last month, in a radar trap.
Luckily, Adam fixed it."

WEDNESDAY, 12 JANUARY 1966

Clare still swapped one night a week off with Stephanie and reported
subsequent events to Gilda, who now aged the shoe shop: occasionally
she visited Clare for an evening meal.

As Clare poured sherry, Gilda asked, "So how was the BOAC pilot?" 
"Tony was the worst yet."  Clare never felt embarrassed discussing sex
with Gilda, who could talk about little else.

"He'd read all the sex manuals ever printed.  Whipped a porn magazine
out of his flight case after the first gin and tonic.  He was coldly
determined to be a good lover.  For me, that was a total turn-off."

"Porn pictures are a turn-off to most women.  Women like words, not
pictures," Gilda said as she sipped her drink.

"But I'm starting to think that everything's a turn-off for you, doll.
You clearly can't have sex with fellas you ain't fond of.  I expect you
need a chap you know well, someone you feel comfortable with, not these
one-nighters."  She swallowed half the glass.

"Now me, I'm the reverse.  If I don't give a damn about 'em, I ain't
anxious, and if I ain't anxious, then I come easy."  She drained her
glass.

"When Tony couldn't get me to climax, he wanted to ask another girl
over," Clare said.

"He automatically assumed that I was a lesbian."

"That's not what he meant," Gilda said.

"Lots of guys find it a turn-on to watch two women making love."  How
very odd.  Can you imagine a woman trying to get .1wo men into bed so
she could watch th em?"  Forget this guy," said Gilda.

"I know what you need, Clare: someone you know and trust, someone who
won't make you feel anxious.  Then you'll relax and it'll happen then
you'll stop being one of them miserable nymphos who bop from man to
man, hoping for Mr.  Right, the man who can satisfy her."  As Gilda
held out her glass to be refilled, 1..,she added reflectively,
"Although you seem more lonely than horny.  Are you looking for sex, or
just someone to Ulk to?  You ain't likely to pick up Prince Charming in
a bar."  Clare said, "I'm not looking for Prince Charming.  I don't
want the disorder, the pain, the mess, or the misery of being in love. 
I just want a short-term relationship, without responsibility."  Gilda
laughed.

"So do these fellas you pick up.  But I'm not convinced that's right
for you.  You need a secure situation with someone you can trust, who
you know will stick around because he loves you.  I'll tell you who you
ought to fall in love with, Clare."

"Who?"  "Yourself.  You clearly think that you're a piece of worthless
rubbish, and if I pick up those vibes, then so do the blokes.  Why not
give sex a rest for a bit, and pay a bit of attention to yourself?  You
never want to make a man the centre of your existence.  That place is
for you, Clare."  "I am the centre of my existence," Clare sang, as if
chanting a psalm, pitching her voice an octave lower, as she pushed
Josh to her play group the next morning.

A man stood on the porch, his hands in the pocket of his beige
mackintosh.

"Good morning.  Are you a prospective parent?"  Clare asked.  She felt
in her pocket for the key.

"No," said the man.

"I'm an inspector for the local education authority!

After examining the bathroom, the inspector pointed out that legally
one toilet was required for every seven kiddies.

Clare said, "But if each child goes there every two and a half hours,
one lavatory is adequate.  There is a potty for emergencies.  We have
never had a problem."

The inspector was not listening.  He was making notes on other
violations.

Half an hour after the inspector left, as if to prove his point, the
lavatory refused to flush.

The following morning, Clare's play group was ordered to close.

Two days later, Clare's mind was unexpectedly diverted from her
personal problems no job, no man when the CND office telephoned to ask
her for voluntary evening help: they were organizing another protest
after a nuclear accident.  Over Spain, an American B-52 bomber carrying
an H-bomb had collided in mid-air with another aircraft.  The H-bomb,
with an explosive capacity of mpre than a million tons of TNT, had
fallen into the Atlantic Ocean off southern Spain.

Clare felt cheered to be back among like-minded people, doing something
worth while.

MONDAY, 14 FEBRUARY 1966

Valentine's Day brought two happy events.  The radio reported that the
missing H-bomb had been located on the Atlantic seabed.  And to Clare's
delight, she sold the lease of the apartment in which she ran her play
group for a profit of twenty-three per cent.

Clare felt as if she had won a sweepstake.  On the following morning,
she bought a portable TV, a warm winter ZPS,4W.  for herself, and new
clothes for Josh.  She didn't buy f Josh because she had decided to
open a toy toys or Two weeks later, Clare bought the short lease of a
small shop in the Pimlico Road, close to Mrs.  Gooden's home.  Though
there was a lot to do, Clare, busy redecorating the shop and visiting
wholesalers to buy stock, still managed to work one evening a week for
the Movement.

In mid-April, just before her toy shop opened, Clare's weary, amiable,
National Health doctor looked up from his desk and said, "About your
vaginal symptoms, Mrs.  Shapiro.  You'd better go to St.  Stephen's for
tests: they're properly equipped to handle this sort of thing."  He
seemed uneasy.

"What sort of thing?  ... Not ... can cerT "No, gonorrhoea," the doctor
said apologetically.

Clare almost fainted from surprise and anxiety, horror and shame.  Then
she wept.

The doctor refused to give her more sleeping tablets but scribbled a
prescription for tranquillizers, which were increasingly prescribed for
women like Clare, with symptoms of anxiety in stressful situations such
as poverty, divorce, or bereavement; women with marital problems and
women who were out of work also found them helpful, although the pills
did nothing to resolve the problem responsible for the initial
anxiety.

Clare, who blushed with shame whenever she thought about it, waited
anxiously for the result of her tests at St.  Stephen's Hospital.

The tests were negative.  But within a month, she couldn't get through
the day without tranquillizers; she felt less anxious, calmer.

Clare managed to open the Red Rocking Horse by mid May  At the opening
party, an excited three-and-a-half year-old Josh rode the pretty
antique red rocking horse in the shop window.

MONDAY, 15 AUGUST 1966

Standing by the swimming pool at Saracen, Miranda beckoned to Adam, who
was floating on the water in a transparent blow-up plastic armchair.

In a voice of soft persuasion, she said, "Will you do something for me,
Adam?  I'm going to learn to fly.  I want you to break the news gently
to Gran."

"But you promised your grandmother not to learn to fly," Adam
objected.

"It was a condition of her gift to you the ten thousand pounds" capital
to start KITS."

"I didn't say for ever.  I'll pay the money back to her."  Miranda was
defiant.

"I've always wanted to fly.  I won't be held by a promise that was
unfairly extracted from me before I legally became an adult.  And I get
bored with nothing to do on holiday but lie in the sun."

"When are you star tine  Adam asked, resigned.

"This morning, at the Cannes flying school.  They have English
instructors.  Four hours of instruction a day for two weeks.  And of
course, this time of year, it's perfect flying weather!"  Miranda was
triumphant now.

"I've already passed the two written exams.  Did law and meteorology
last Easter, and now I've finished navigation, radiotelephony, and
technical that was the toughest."

"So that's why you're so pate."  Three hours later, two thousand feet
above the Mediterranean, Miranda, alert and exultant, sat next to her
instructor at the controls of a trainer plane, an ugly little single
engine Rallye which her instructor described as efficient and
forgiving: you could do something wrong in a Rallye without getting
immediately punished for it.

Flying was even better than she had hoped: better than skiing, better
than driving a sports car.  As the Rallye droned towards the lighthouse
on the tip of Cap Camerat,

Airanda felt as if she were breathing the air of the gods..."Odntly
they swooped, turned, and climbed in the azure sky.

After they reached two thousand feet, the instructor showed her how to
fly level; he then encouraged her to experiment with the stick,
manoeuvring the plane in every direction.  Miranda felt that the
aircraft was an extension of her arms and her fingertips, outspread in
flight.  I Heading west on the return flight path, the instructor said,
"This is the first time I've flown with a pupil and haven't once needed
to touch the controls."  Miranda pushed home this advantage.

"Then can I land?"  The instructor hesitated, then said, "Why not?" 
The girl was clearly a natural flyer.

After being given clearance to land, Miranda, following her
instructor's directions, started her approach; she throttled back to
reduce speed and control her descent as she flew towards the threshold
the point just before she intended to touch down.  The plane was now
moving at not much above stalling speed.  As the Rallye dropped to
about thirty feet above the runway, Miranda throttled back completely
and held the stick back.

The plane seemed to glide forward and land itself.  The undemonstrative
Miranda flung her arms around the instructor.

"Oh, thank you!  Thank you!  .. ."

"Quite a smooth landing," the instructor said approvingly.  He
hesitated, then warned, "Next time be careful not to land too fast or
you'll run out of runway."  This woman was adventurous and ambitious:
such pilots did not live long.  He added, "Careful pilots are the ones
that survive.  A good pilot never takes a risk."

"The opposite of a good businessman," Miranda said, still on a high.

"A businessman has to take risks constantly and win sixty per cent of
the time."

"In the air, that risk factor would kill you."

Nine hundred years earlier, the great hall had been the.  hub of
castle life: wolfhounds ate on floors strewn with rushes; servants
slept on straw pallets thrown on the floor.  Then, the winter salon did
not smell of lilies and expensive leather but of stale, fat, stinking
human bodies and animal ordure.  Elinor sometimes thought of all the
love and the hatred, the treachery and the killing that this hall had
undoubtedly seen, when strong men fought hand-to-hand to the death, to
protect their women and children.

Now the winter salon at Saracen, where Elinor waited for Adam, was not
only the coolest but the most impressive room in the chdteau.  High
arched walls of pale, honey coloured stone were hung with bluish-green
tapestries; around the big stone fireplace, where logs burned in
winter, stood sofas covered in the blues and greens of the tapestries;
here and there were lamps, flowers, books, and piles of parlour
games.

"What's keeping Ada mT Elinor asked Buzz, who was adding up the
Scrabble score.

"You said three o'clock.  It's only two-thirty," Buzz said.

"Ninety-three for you, two hundred and sixty-four for me..  That's not
a bad score for you, Nell."  Buzz never cheated to let Elinor win: she
knew that Elinor would immediately sense this and feel humiliated.

After an intensive rehabilitation programme of physiotherapy and speech
therapy, Elinor appeared to have completely recovered from her stroke,
although she could no longer think of three things at once, which Buzz
said was a mercy for the people who had to live with her.

Elinor was sometimes at a loss for the right word, or name, and then
became impatient with herself; she was often frustrated because she
couldn't move as swiftly as she did before.  At times, she was
downhearted and wondered whether she would ever write another book.

"When you want to write, you'll write," Buzz would tell her then.

w Buzz grunted, "Look what I tore out of the Daily She dug into her
pocket, unfolded a bit of newspaper, and read, ""Sportsman Jim Clark
today opened a splendidly equipped physical training college at
Larkwood in Wiltshire, formerly the family home of the O'Dare family.
Lady O'Dare commented,"I wish them well."" i doubt that."  Elinor
peered at the photograph of the new owner, a motor-racing hero,
standing with her sisterin-law, Madorie.

The doorbell sounded.

"I'll go," Buzz said.

"It's either Adam or the postman."  Buzz returned reading a postcard.

"It's for you, from Sonia Rushleigh ... Whoops, I mean Bromley.  Who'd
have thought them two would marry?  She says the Coloners taken up
petit point, and Miss Hawkins is teaching him.  Remember her, the
schoolmistress?"  "I do indeed," said Elinor.

"Frumpy sourpuss!  Who's the letter fro mT "Clare."  Buzz held the
envelope out to Elinor.

Elinor shook her head.

"You open it."

"It's marked personal."

"I don't want to read it, unless she apologizes."  Buzz opened the
letter and read it.  She shook her head.

"It's just a friendly letter, asking how you are.  But reading between
the lines, I think Clare needs money."

"If she took her poor child back to his father and gave her husband a
second chance, she wouldn't need money."

"How about a bit of generosity?"  Buzz said.

"You're a silly, stubborn old woman.  And Clare's just as stubborn and
just as silly.  It wouldn't have hurt her to say she was sorry.

Elinor looked anxious.

"Do you really think she's short of money, Buzz?  I wouldn't want her
to have a rough time., This remark was overheard by Adam as, in pale
blue shirt and jeans, he sauntered through the door.  He said,
"Elinor, you allowed ample provision in the trust for helping Clare if
the trustees consider that help is needed.  I'll check on Clare when I
get back to London.!  He put a pile of papers on a side table.

"There's rather a lot of paperwork here, things that you should be
aware of."

"We've had more paperwork, not less, since the trust took over," Buzz
said tartly.

"And I tell you frankly that I can't follow it, Adam.  I thought the
trustees were going to manage the business.  Elinor shouldn't be made
to wade though pages of paragraphs with no commas in'em."

"Of course the trustees manage the business, and they do it very well,"
Adam said.

"And there's no reason for Elinor to see any of this if it tires her.
In fact, I'm about to suggest something that would simplify matters."

"What's th at?"  Buzz asked.

"I'd like to substitute Paul Littlejohn for myself in the power of
attorney that I hold on your behalf, Elinor.  I'm trying to reduce the
number of business administrators: the fewer there are, the simpler the
system and the cheaper it will be."

"Does that mean that Paul will be legally responsible for Elinor's
affairs instead of you, Ada mT "Yes, but that's only a technicality.
Paul will do as I say.  And I'd also like you to sign this document,"
Adam added, "which absolves me and STG from any further responsibility
once Paul Littlejohn has been substituted."  Buzz said, "But surely..."
Smoothly Adam explained, "The responsibility must clearly rest in only
one area.  It's in your interests to clarify the situation.  It's
customary."

"If you think that's best, Adam dear."  Elinor frowned slightly at
Buzz.

Adam decided to hold back Miranda's bombshell until later, after Elinor
drank her evening glass of champagne.

t fore five o'clock, when the business session had be and the afternoon
was still hot, quiet, and heavy with languor, Buzz left to get some
tea.

Adam escorted Elinor to the elevator; after taking her to her bedroom,
he intended to go to the beach for a swim..  In the high-ceilinged
kitchen, surrounded by the smells of mint and basil, Buzz whistled
"Roses of Picardy" with much dramatic warbling as she prepared Elinor's
tea.

1da ves and yellow blossoms obscured the top of the window, while the
bottom was covered by aggressive pink hollyhocks, seemingly determined
to fight their way inside.

Sylvie, the cook, sat at the big kitchen table by the window, writing a
list and shooing pigeons away.  The bane of Sylvie's life was the
pigeon droppings that littered the windowsill and had to be cleaned up
daily.

With a shudder, Sylvie refused a cup of tea.  Still whistling, Buzz
laid the tray.

The soporific calm.  of the drowsy afternoon was shattered by the bell
indicator above the kitchen door.

Someone was jabbing the bell non-stop in Elinor's bedroom.  Knowing
that Adam was probably in the elevator on his way to the beach, Buzz
hurled herself out of the kitchen and ran upstairs.

Frantically she tore open the door to Elinor's apartment.  In the
passage, she stumbled and almost fell, then flung back the door to the
bedroom.

To her relief, Elinor was not slumped on the floor; deathly white, she
clung for support to the silver brocade hangings of her bed.
Wordlessly, she pointed above the fireplace.

Buzz turned her head to the left, where the portrait of the three
sisters hung.

At first Buzz saw nothing, but then she gasped in horror.

Each of the three long, creamy necks had been cut horizontally: a
small triangle of canvas hung downward from each slashed throat.

CHAPTER 18

WEDNESDAY, 17 AUGUST 1966

In the foyer of the Clanrickard Club, Mike Grant leaned against the
wall at the bottom of a double-sided curving staircase.  With his hands
in the pockets of his dinner jacket, he surveyed the room.  It was
going to be a good night, in spite of the fact that it was August and a
Wednesday.  Making sure to appear casual, he carefully watched the men
in dinner jackets and the women in full-length ikcol- kt dresses move
slowly over the red carpet towards the restaurant at the rear, or climb
the staircase to the gaining rooms.

Mike noticed a group of heavy gamblers, most of them Greek, move
towards the baccarat room, where the Sultan of Rupolei had been losing
for the last hour.  His attention was also caught by a woman dressed in
midnight-blue satin and diamonds; the sister of a Middle-Eastern ruler,
she was known as an audacious gambler.  He stiffened as he recognized a
man move upstairs with a distinctive, boneless saunter: he had better
send someone up to check the backgammon room.  The club owners, the
casinos, and the multinational bookmakers knew which professional
gamblers successfully played games that contained an element of skill
such as backgammon and poker and they preferred to have nothing to do
with them; ideally, the house welcomed inexperienced, rich idiots.

"This is certainly a good night to play the odds."  Mike heard a
sarcastic voice from behind him.

He turned and smiled at Adam.

"Come into my office for a drink.  What' supT In Mike's office,
furnished with heavily varnished Victorian club furniture, Adam shook
his head curtly at the offer of a chair.

"I'm not staying," he said.

"I merely wanted to tell you that you've scared the hell out of
everyone at Saracen except me.  So kindly curb your theatrical, James
Bond streak.  I knew immediately what your message meant: "If you don't
pay up, one slash is all it takes."" He glared at his brother.

"I thought you were fond of Elinor.  I seem to recall that Elinor
helped you to buy your first good bike.  Why drag her into my problems?
You might have given her another stroke."

"I don't know what the hell you're talking about, and I can't comment
until I do."  Mike, his face alert and wary, lit a cigarette.

Adam briefly described how the triple portrait had been slashed and
added, "D'you really expect me to believe that you had nothing to do
with it?  Someone told some cat burglar where to find that picture!"

Mike stared at his brother, then slowly said, "Not me.  I agree, it's
clearly a warning to pay, but I swear I know nothing about it.  It
couldn't have 'been the brothers they'd be even less subtle .. ."  He
inhaled deeply.

"Who else do you owe money, Adam, you stupid bastard?"  "No one who'd
do anything so bloody childish!  How do I stop this bloody nonsense?" 
"How many times must I tell you that if you let things go too far,
nobody can stop what will undoubtedly happen?  Adam," Mike went on
quietly, "you've always taken full advantage of anyone who's fond of
you.  You think you can push me around because you've been doing that
since we were in the nursery.  You also grew up watching Grandfather's
clients literally get away with murder."  He sucked on his cigarette,
furiously threw it into the fireplace, shoved his hands in his pockets,
and glared at Adam.

"Do you want to be found washed up on the seashore with a few i bits
missing?  Are you so anxious to know what it feels no have both
eyeballs gouged out, one at a time?  Do you want to be slowly battered
to death, before dying in agony?"  "Of course not, you bastard," Adam
said.

"I only want to know who slashed that picture if you didn't."

"Whoever they are and only you know that these people are serious.
Punters often try to avoid paying.  Examples often have to be made. You
know that."  Mike star tod to stride up and down the room.

"Take that fucking urbane look off your face and face reality, Adam. If
you lose money, that's tough.  But if you don't pay up, that's
insanity.9 "I've had enough of your melodrama," Adam snarled.

Mike glared at his brother again.

"I'm not exaggerating.  ""Remember that incident when the Sultan's
sister had her Rolls stopped, at two in the morning on the Grande
Corniche, after leaving the casino?  They blew away the chaufcues head
with a machine gun.  She wasn't touched.  She paid all her gambling
debts the very next day.  And when .."Ahe story was' carefully leaked
to the newspapers, quite a ""Aat of other debts were suddenly settled
in full."  6 I'm not some goddamned sultan's sister."  No, but you also
like playing with fire.  You never be that the gods will really let it
bum you.  You think you're omnipotent but you aren't."

"Keep your voice down, "Adam gr?wled.

"I'll do what I bloody well like in my own office," Mike said.

"Don't you understand?  I'm on your side, Adam.  You're the only
brother I have."  His voice deepened.

"I'm probably more worried about this than you are.  If anything
happened to you ... I'd be left without you.  So for God's -sake, pay
up, you stupid shit!  Don't think you can get way with it just because
you've always got away with everything, since you set that nursemaid's
apron alight."

"I thought you were too young to remember that," Adam said uneasily.
He added, "She shouldn't have left the matches within reach of a
child."

"She was in hospital for six weeks, and I was the only one who knew it
wasn't an accident.  I knew you wanted to see how far you could go."

"Let's not argue about something that happened over thirty years ago,"
Adam said finally.

"Can you raise money to help me fend them off?  I promise you, within
six months I know I'll have no more money problems.  Never again."

"You'll have money problems as long as you gamble, Adam."

Annabel was determined to get a grip on herself and do as Scott
advised: remember 1965 as the year she stopped having to go to
auditions and 1966 as the year in which she blossomed into a successful
young New York hostess as she met Andy Warhol, Lenny Bernstein, Baby
Jane Holzer, and all the other gossip-columnist fodder.  By July,
Annabel was a Junior Friend of the Metropolitan Museum, a Friend of the
Museum of Modern Art, and a patron of the Bronx Zoo.  She also allayed
her insecurity with a massive spending spree: each charity dinner
required a new ball gown and each new glittering friend contacts for
Scott required a glittering party.  So the year thus far was a busy
one.

FRIDAY, 19 AUGUST 1966

On the hottest morning of the year, Scott's news editor asked him to
step into his office.

From behind the untidy piles on his desk, the news editor said, "Shut
the door and prepare to listen to some good advice, Scott.  I know you
went after an anchor job last year and didn't get it.  I know you're
now up for 1,7 .  anchor job.  I know you're going to be interviewed
ww" M.4 W know which network it is, so don't deny a thing."  He Jfidvd
a paper cup of lukewarm coffee across the desk to Cou.

"I'd rather you went after it with my support than behind my back.  At
least if a guy from a local station gets S'prominent network job, it
reflects well on that station."  He picked up his cup, took a whiff of
it, and put it down again.

"In order to get that job, Scott, you have to clarify thing in your
mind a picture of what they're looking for as an anchorman."  Scott
said nothing.

"Forget the crusading-journalist approach, Scott.  Or the hard-nosed,
insistent, tough approach.  That's what everyone applying for that job
will pitch.  The network is looking for something extra.  They want
someone who looks as if his been shot at, wounded, and spent the day
crawling Orough minefields to deliver the dispatches.  So don't go
Jonking too neat.  On the other hand, don't go looking too battered:
they aren't looking for Walter Huston, they're Jo-olang for.  a
younger, well-scrubbed, cheerfully confident Robert Mitchum."  I don't
think they're looking for a battered glamour boy," Scott said.

"They're looking for a first-class pro- Ossionaljournalist."

"Me news editor looked cynical.

"Viewers don't switch channels for a good professional journalist; what
prompts That switch is something less tangible."

"And they also want something else," Scott went on quietly.

"A quality that you and I share."

"What's th at?"  "Devotion.  We love this business.  You'd rather be
doing louriobthan anythingelsein the world  You feel guilty about
joying it so much.  The real reason you often put in fourteen Aours
seven days a week is because you t1ink it's important 1hat people know
what's happening in their world."

Jake laughed.

"You can buy me a drink after you land the job One week after Scott's
interview with the network, Jake arrived at his office to find a bottle
of pure malt Highland whisky standing on top of the papers on his
desk.

FRIDAY, 26 AUGUST 1966

The feather an ordinary pale grey pigeon's feather softly traced
Miranda's thighs.  She sighed sleepily.  They'd had a wonderful
afternoon.

The secret of Adam's sexual success with women was simple: he took
plenty of time to stroke or massage, to make sure that his partner was
completely relaxed before they made love.  Then he always made sure
that she climaxed before he entered her.  Gradually Adam would discover
where and how each woman liked to be touched, and he would change his
techniques to suit her, then move on to something that she wasn't
expecting or had never experienced.

Adam blew the feather into the air and let it drift to the floor.  He
stretched.

"Looks as if we're in for a storm."  Miranda slipped from her bed and
wandered to a window; leaning out, she smelled rosemary and eucalyptus
as she watched the summer storm approach from the distant cobalt-blue
mountains.  The bright light of Provence changed theatrically as the
sky darkened to grey, then turned slate purple.

After an ominous moment of silence, when not a leaf fluttered, two
incandescent white worms of lightning flashed across the sky.  A mighty
clash of thunder followed, after which heavy rain fell.  Below Miranda,
the dusty terra cotta tiles of the medieval roofs were slicked and
sharpened to glistening ochre, tangerine, and brown.  Then it was
curtain fell in front of the window, blotting out a grey Mwgi dolour.
Miranda frowned at the rain; her visitors would shortly be arriving at
the village hotels, for she had decided to hold the KITS annual sales
conference weekend at Saracen.

JMe sales conference, held just before the all-important Christmas
run-up began, was meant to psych up the sales fom for the new line.
Miranda loved everything about the sales conference except making her
speech.  She really ought to rehearse that presentation again, she
thought.  She drew in her head, shut the windows, pulled the heavy
cream linen curtains, and switched on the lamps; they glowed cheerfully
over the primrose chair covers and the yellow silk bed quilt, upon
which Adam lay naked.

"I'd better creep off," Adam said.

"It's nearly five o'clock.  This place will be humming with staff in a
few minutes."  Miranda, sounding slightly mutinous, said, "I don't see
why we can't sleep together openly."

"Because we're not married," Adam said, "because I'm not an earl."

"I don't intend to marry to please my grandmother."

"Soon," Adam said firmly, "but not yet.  I'm too busy with SUPPLY KITS
But there's something else I must discuss with you before I leave."
Miranda, not wishing to quarrel with Adam, did not pursue her
argument.

SUPPLY KITS was negotiating for three businesses, and Adam was handling
all three deals: a direct-mail business, a premium-gift business, and a
public-relations business.  Should all the deals be successful, SUPPLY
KITS would then own five subsidiary businesses, including KITS.

A director from each of the new companies would acquire shares and sit
on the SUPPLY KITS board; as Miranda owned the entire company, these
inducement shares would reduce her holding, but Adam had convinced a
reluctant Miranda that by relinquishing fifteen per cent of her shares,
she was exchanging a hundred per cent of a small orange for eighty-five
per cent of a crateful.

Adam turned on to his back, his hands behind his head, and looked at
the ceiling.

"It's about time we considered going public."

Astonished, Miranda sat down on the edge of the bed.

"So soon?  Why?"  "We can't do it until next March, when we'll have
five years" trading figures to show," Adam said.

"But such a move would provide more cash for acquisitions.  We can't go
on leveraging for ever."

"No," said Miranda, remembering that Angus had warned her about this.

"But won't it be expensive to go public?"

"Very expensive," Adam said.

"But you want more outlets for KITS and you want them in the best and
most expensive locations."

"So the reason to go public is to finance expansion?"  "Not only that.
We'll also be more respectable and credit worthy

"What about control?"  Miranda worried.

"I don't want to lose control of my business."

"You won't lose control so long as you retain over fifty per cent of
the shares," Adam reassured her.

"But nobody should have all their capital invested in one sector of the
market, as you have.  You should sell some shares for cash and invest
that money in other areas.  Arrange a nice, well spread portfolio for
yourself.  It's about time you saw some financial reward for your work
and responsibility."

"How many SUPPLY KITS shares would I have to se lIT "Legally,
twenty-five per cent of the shares have to be made available to the
public.  The new directors will y abI be pleased to sell their
incentive shares for such a 'k profit, so you should only lose ten per
cent of your W present holding.  If we issue new shares, you'll end up
with seventy-five per cent of the business and a large sum of cash."

"I'd like the staff to be able to have shares," Miranda aid, "to
benefit from the success of the business."

"We can certainly arrange that, should SUPPLY KITS -go public
"I'll'think about it."

Adam said, "It will take at least six months to organize, so think
fast."

FRIDAY, 9 SEPTEMBER 1966

Four months after Clare opened her toy shop, her bank manager advised
her to close it as quickly as possible, because she was losing money at
a steady and frightening pace.  He advised her to sell the shop and
deposit the money in the bank.  She had better not invest it in the
stock market, because she couldn't afford to lose a penny and there was
no such thing as a safe share.

Over supper at the basement flat, Clare discussed her woes with Kathy,
her former nanny.

"It was apparently doomed from the start," Clare explained sadly, over
the baked beans.

"The sort of people who can afford handcrafted learning toys don't shop
at the wrong end of the Pimlico Road."  She scraped out the dish.

"I concentrated on toys for pre-school children because I thought I
knew about them.  But those children didn't want well-made, tasteful,
pale wood Swedish toys.  What they wanted was cheap, bright, plastic
toys from Hong Kong, and I didn't stock those."

"Couldn't you sell Lego and stuff like th at?"  "I had plenty of Lego,
but what they really wanted were the expensive toys they saw advertised
on children's TV."

"Well, couldn't you have sold a few of tho seT "By the time I realized
that, I had no spare cash," Clare explained.

"And that wasn't my only problem.  The importers weren't reliable, and
neither were the craftsmen, especially those who persuaded me to pay
them in advance.  Then I got in a financial muddle because I didn't
keep my bookkeeping up to date."

"It sounds like a nightmare," Kathy said.

Clare shuddered.

"The worst problem was theft."  Her entire gross profit for the first
four months had been negated by shoplifting tots.  The first time Clare
caught a little girl hiding a rag doll up her knickers, she angrily
threatened to call a policeman.  The child burst into tears.  Clare,
contrite, gave her the doll as a gift.

At the beginning of October, Kathy, who had again been invited for
supper, arrived at Clare's apartment to find that nothing had been
cooked.  Clare, wearing a dirty dressing gown, was sitting on her
unmade bed, staring into space.

"Where's Josh?"  Kathy asked.

"I put him to bed early.  It's good for him."  Kathy made two cups of
tea and said firmly, "You aren't yourself, Clare, and you haven't been
for months."  I'm still depressed about the Red Rocking Horse," Clare
replied vaguely.

"This started before that toy shop closed," Kathy said.

"I think it's those pills you take.  Why not stop th em?"  "Don't be
silly my doctor prescribed those tranquillizers," Clare said.

"He's a qualified doctor and you aren't, Kathy."

"But I know you better than he does!  You aren't the same person since
you started taking those things, Clare.  You don't listen to what I'm
saying.  You don't play with Josh like you used to you just sit! You've
even stopped working for CND."  i'Jvould easily do without the pills,"
Clam said crossly.

not just yet."  She started to weep drearily.

"I don't 0, to be successful at anything.  I used to be such a smug
little prig.  I was so sure I knew what was right, so critical other
people.  Now I've found out how hopeless I am on wn ... Y u'd be a lot
less hopeless if you were thinking Kathy advised.

"Why don't you get away from move to the country.?  You're always
saying you ."M'sAmlied you still lived in the country.  And you could
live in 'the country on what you're wasting in rent for this dump!" She
looked around the room with distaste.

"Go to that Vlace where you grew up and tell a local estate agent you
want the cheapest thing he's got.  Try to get it before Christmas,
because I've got a bit of time off then, and I'll help you settle in."
Mrs.  Gooden agreed to let Josh stay with her until Clare sorted out
her problems and found somewhere to live.

The day he left, Kathy said to Clare, "I'll come round every evening
and you can phone me any time I've asked my boss."  To Clare's horror,
Kathy then flushed the pills d" the sink drain.

"Now you know you'll have to manage she said firmly.  without' em
During the first day without her pills, Clare grew increasingly
depressed and agitated.  By the evening, her mouth was dry, her hands
had started to shake, and she felt dizzy.  She didn't sleep at all that
night.  Her hands trembled too badly to cook and she sweated as if in
the tropics.  Frightened by these bodily reactions, she collapsed on
the sofa and cried.

The following evening, when Kathy came to check on her, it was obvious
that Clare blamed her for the shape she was in.

"If you go back to the doctor for another prescription,"

Kathy told her, "we'll only have to go through this again later.  Now
eat this stew I've brought."  By the fifth morning, Clare's hands no
longer trembled.  On the eighth day, she felt her normal, clear-headed
self again.  Deeply grateful to Kathy, she said, "Tomorrow I'm going to
pick up Josh, take the train to Warminster, and look for a place where
we can start all over again."

Applebank Cottage, made of local soft Bath stone, was damp and cold,
but as the agent pointed out, what did Clare expect for two pounds per
week?  All it needed was some heat.

From the garden gate to the front door, a herringbone brick path
divided a neglected vegetable garden.  Apple trees grew on either side
of the double-sided small house, and behind it the land rose smoothly
to a small wood that followed the ridge of a hill.

Clare moved in just before Christmas, with a minimum of furniture
bought second-hand at an auction in Warminster.  She hoped that Kathy
was right, and that once away from the city, with enough money, for her
simple everyday needs, she would gradually find herself able to cope
again.

SUNDAY, 25 DECEMBER 1966

Neither Annabel the hostess at a big charity children's skating party
at Rockefeller Center nor Clare not invited was present at Elinor's
1966 Christmas Day luncheon at Saracen, but Miranda and Adam were
there, both arriving with bulging briefcases of work papers,

After the traditional turkey and Christmas pudding made by Buzz, for
Sylvie thought the recipe ludicrous, everyone left the table for a
siesta.  A few minutes later, Miranda sneaked to Adam's bedroom.

After they made love, Adam lay naked on the bed, stared, contentedly at
the ceiling.  Beside him, Miranda felt too to think, too tired to move.
She wondered how long .00 Fould be able to continue at her present
pace.  A,dam picked up a yellow legal pad and scribbled on it.  iie
murmured, "Can you manage that dinner at the Mansion House next
Thursday?"

If you insist."  Miranda yawned.  Miranda was the promiPLYKITS floy
displayed figurehead of the SUP on, planned for three months ahead: she
had become the corporate identity of the company; her face, clothes,
style had become the visual embodiment of her busiMiranda was publicly
perceived as an intelligent, modern woman on the move the new sixties
woman, not oontent to sit at home and wait for things to happen to her
Because of this, Miranda, who hated being photo- W,aphed or
interviewed, had been obliged to entertain important people:
pension-fund managers, stockbrokers, bank and financial journalists.
These business obligations,gtmade her feel impatient and frustrated:
she would have ?,""Tgefeffed to spend her time working in her cosmetics
busiam.  KITS needed much more of her attention than it had Jbeen
getting recently, and was now in a disturbing financial i1vtosiffion;
it didn't look as if the company would make a "profit in 1966.

Although Adam pointed out that a profit was projected or the whole
group, and that the group, expansion had phenomenal, Miranda felt a
wistful longing for the ""Vld, less comfortable days not so very long
ago when "KITS had been her brilliant baby.  Now Adam interrupted
Miranda's reverie by saying, " y the way, Paul Littlejohn says that the
trustees regretfully must turn down your request for funds to
redecorate your -house.  Apparently there have been big extra bills for
Saracen this year; this place costs a fortune to run."

"Blast," Miranda mumbled into her pillow.

"The trustees are only doing their job," Adam soothed.

"After all, you can't expect them to go on saying yes for ever."  He
turned away from her as the telephone rang.

"Hello?  Mike?  Had a good Christmas?  So it arrived on time ... A
Harley-Davidson Sportster was exactly what you wanted .. . Of course I
can afford it ... No, the panic's over ... Happy New Year, little
brother ... I know you're thirty-four years old ... Then I won't in
future ... We're coming back tomorrow, in Miranda's plane ... Ciao."

The day after Christmas, at six a.m."  when it was still dark outside,
Elinor stood in the entrance hall waiting to say goodbye to Miranda and
Adam.  Buzz, only half awake, wore an old Jaeger dressing gown that now
looked like something from a dog basket.

"Buzz, please go and hurry Miranda!"  Elinor said, smiling
apologetically at Adam.

"It's been a wonderful Christmas," Adam said to Elinor as soon as Buzz
disappeared.

"I've used this peaceful break to consider something very important to
me, and last night I reached my decision.  I am going to leave STG and
start my own practice."  Elinor stared, astonished.

"But why, Adam?  It's your family firm .. ."

"Quite frankly, Elinor and in confidence STG has been handling too many
criminal cases for my liking.  I don't think a respectable firm should
take such a direction, however lucrative.  I'm certain my father would
never have allowed it.  I'm not letting down STG there are now
seventeen senior partners and I'm only one of them.  And since my
speciality is international tax law, I feel ... somewhat regretfully..
."

"How will your decision affect my business?"  Elinor asked sharply.

36o up to you, Elinor.  You will have to choose between and me ... I
shall carry the same professional inogrance as STG, by the way."

"I wish you could have talked about this when we had more time, Adam."
Elinor was vexed.

"Until last night, I was undecided.  You are the first n I have told,
Elinor.  I only wish that my father know that I'm at last setting up on
my own ... If want to stay with STG, I'll be happy to arrange to your
work handled by one of the other partners though it may take him a
little time to be able to handle all, completely on his own without
asking you a I don't want to deal with some new lawyer.  to change.  I
want my affairs handled prop without a lot of questions.  And if you're
setting up own firm, I'm sure your dear father would want me help you
start.  So please arrange it."  The simplest thing would be for you to
write to STG and say you no longer wish them to represent you.  Ask
them to submit their bill to date I'll check it, of course nd.  hand
all your papers to me.  No need to type the letter in fact, a
handwritten note would perhaps be best."  Adam's brown eyes looked
sincere.

"I can't tell you how much I appreciate this, Elinor.  I only wish that
Dad could know of your loyalty."

CHAPTER19

MONDAY, 26 DECEMBER 1966

On the morning after Christmas, peaceful demonstrations organized by
the CND took place all over Britain.

In Bath, the march started from the courtyard of Bath Abbey, which
demonstrators had been forbidden to enter; the beautifully carved
golden stone entrance to the abbey was protected by police horses. They
stamped impatiently, legs shifting and snorting breath visible on the
crisp, thin air.

Clare, wearing an old red ski suit, stood in a crowd of about three
hundred people.  She had left Josh with Kathy, who was spending
Christmas at Applebank Cottage.  Clare's banner, made from an old sheet
kept taut by two broom handles, was painted with the red words BAN
THE

BOMB.

At eleven o'clock, the demonstrators formed a line in front of the
abbey and prepared to parade slowly through the streets of the historic
Georgian city.  They were watched by a straggle of housewives and
schoolchildren, and a photographer from the local paper.

Clare took up her position on the abbey side of the line.  Just as the
column began to move, a schoolgirl, pushing a baby in a pram,
accidentally backed into a police horse.  The horse, trained to keep
calm, hardly moved, but the schoolgirl shrieked in terror and let go of
her pram, which ran into the column of marchers; it hit the man
standing next to Clare, who stumbled heavily against her, knocking her
sideways.

As Clare staggered, her arms dropped and her banner dropped around her
head'.  she could not see where she was tottered to her right, bumped
into a police She hindquarters, stumbled against the horse, then
screamed as she was pulled violently backwards by strong arm.  Someone
helped her to struggle free from her banner.  looked up and saw the
tallest man she had ever seen; curly black hair and black-lashed, dark
brown eyes, 4 filled with worry.  M man half carried, half pulled her
into a nearby pub, -"The 1117,i4here he propped her in a Windsor chair
and went to fetch water from the bar.  Clare, who felt dizzy and
tearful, wonTed whether she would ever again be able to move her Jaw"
which had received a painful blow, probably from the "-troomstick of
her own banner.  She looked across the bar lethe back view of her
rescuer: he wore jeans and an old '""Jnaroon suede jacket buckled
around lean hips; his boots were muddy.

As the man returned with a glass of water, Clare stared his short,
straight nose, above a mouth to write poems abo ut: it was full-lipped,
finely chiselled, subtly curved.  Michelangelo's David come to life,
Clare thought.  She she had worn some make-up, then chastised herself
.4br such a feeble thought.  Her rescuer said impatiently, "Sorry I
took so long.  It's impossible to get water in a bar since they don't
4xiake any money out of it."  He poured water on his handkerOdef, then
gently dabbed at Clare's chin.

"You'll have a ","Ituge bruise ... Is there anyone with you?"  Clare
shook her head.

"You shouldn't drive, or ride a bicycle, after a wallop ftie that. I'll
take you home."  Clare mumbled with difficulty, "No, I'm okay. I'll get
a lift home after the demo.  I've just moved into a cottage on 'e edge
of Warminster."

He drove her back in a battered silver sports car.

To Clare, his milky warm smell was like that of a newborn baby.  She
sternly reminded herself that she wasn't going to fall in love with the
wrong man again just because she was sexually attracted to him, and she
was never going to get married again.  Having decided not to marry him,
Clare directed her rescuer, David Arrowsmith, to Applebank Cottage.

In the kitchen, Kathy's look of incredulous congratulation was followed
by concern when she noticed Clare's battered chin.

Abruptly Clare said to David, "Thank you for bringing me back.  I'll be
perfectly fine now.  Kathy will look after me."  Clare knew that women
often made up their minds very quickly, and without enough information,
about other people, particularly those who were physically attractive
she had just seen Kathy do so.  She also knew that, generally speaking,
good, worthy men did not look flashy and glamorous, let alone
theatrical; on the other hand, many rats were as good-looking as they
were confident.  Clare wouldn't put it past Sam to use a rat to lay a
trap for her.  Like many divorcees, she now viewed the man she had
married as a monster of depravity, as capable as Richard III of any
dirty deed.  Clare's divorce petition would not be heard until July;
she had been warned by her solicitor not to be seen alone with a man
right now, or it might affect her petition and the custody of her son.
She couldn't afford to run any risks, and there was certainly something
mysterious about David Arrowsmith, something she couldn't identify for
the moment: so she didn't trust him.

The following morning, after breakfast, a bruised Clare cut a
photograph of herself from the local newspaper; luckily, her face was
totally obscured by the banner, which had wrapped itself around her
like a winding sheet.  She looked ig'on Egyptian murmny in boots, but
it was a good -of her rescuer.  She slipped the newspaper cutting the
top drawer of her bedside chest, then took the opportunity to go for a
walk by herself, without Josh.  Once past her garden, Clare turned off
the narrow lane Ijt,j a path hedged high with hawthorn, which led up
the gondy rising hill behind the cottage to the wood.  The wood was
disturbingly still and silent; the twisted vunks and naked branches of
the trees looked lonely and w1om.  Not a leaf moved, except for the
dead leaves that chtre trod on.  When she stepped on a stick and
snapped it, sudden noise caused a rook to rise from its nest with a
guarded beating of wings.

She looked up at the rook's nest and the grey sky beyond, then bent to
pick a clump of white winter aconites to take home to Josh.  As she did
so, a rusty trap sprang shut, tlamping her left foot.  Clare yelled in
pain as she fell on scratchy, frosted back en  Luckily, she was wearing
tough boots, so the trap not torn her leg.  She felt little pain unless
she moved, wbkh she tried not to do as she struggled to pull apart the
wrated jaws of the trap.  It was attached to a rusty chain in the
bracken.  Clare could see more rusty chain round the slender, peeling,
silver trunk of a nearby birch w. She would only be able to move within
the circumfereiw, of that tree.  She was truly trapped.  'll"I'll, The
air didn't feel sharply cold enough for snow, and I-Clare hoped it
wouldn't rain; she peered upward at the -vbi ll grey sky.

-She wondered how long it would be before Kathy grew alarmed.  If Clare
wasn't home and hadn't telephoned by two o'clock or three at the latest
she reckoned that "tathy might phone the police, who would surely find
her before long.

Unfortunately, Clare lay off the path in a place where the ground
dipped, so she could not be seen.  With difficulty, she rolled her body
into a more comfortable position, pulled up the collar of her cherry
wool, coat, twisted her scarf around her head, and heaped bracken to
form a pillow; with her head upon it, she stared crossly at the now
leaden sky overhead.  She pushed her hands deeper in her pockets and
wished she had worn heavier gloves.  She wondered if fate had just
punished her for picking wild flowers.

Just before midday, Clare heard a noise behind her.  Abruptly she sat
up, winced at the pain this produced, then listened as the sound grew
nearer: somebody was whistling "Lillibullero" with warbles and
elaborate trills, off-key, but with clear enjoyment.

Clare yelled, "Help!"  several times, then stopped.  She could hear
nothing.  Again she yelled.

This time a man's voice shouted, "Keep calling."  Eventually Clare
heard a distant crackle.  As it grew louder, she twisted around to face
the sound.

"Oh!"  she said.

"It's you!"

"And vice versa," said David Arrowsmith as he scrambled towards her.

He towered above Clare, his hands tucked in the front pockets of the
suede jacket.

"I called to see how you were.  Your nanny told me you'd gone for a
walk.  She saw you come up here."  He squatted beside her.

"Hey, not much of a country girl, are you?"  He examined the trap.

"As a matter of fact, I am," Clare said.

"We used to live near here.  But as this is hunting country, I didn't
expect a trap in the woods.  And Kathy isn't my nanny.  I can't afford
a nanny.  She's been staying with us over the Christmas holiday." 
David tried without success to release Clare.  Eventually he said,
"This is a very old, heavy trap, and I don't think I can force the
thing apart. I'd better phone the police they'll know who owns this
wood, and get him to free you.

my gloves, and try not to get into any more trouble Jim gone."  He
added ruefully, "I know I should tear tMt.  trap apart with my bare
hands, but I'm not as tough as I look."

An hour later, the trap was pried apart by two mech an im from the
local garage using steel bars.  Teethchattering, Clare limped back to
Applebank Cottage with David, Ulling herself not to make a fuss.

After she had a hot rum toddy in a steaming, warm tub glid showed Josh
the trap marks on her leg, they all sat around the wooden kitchen table
to eat vegetable soup, local Stilton cheese, and a salad of walnuts and
chicory, followed by gingerbread that Clare had made with Mrs. Gooden's
special recipe.

Then Josh had his nap and Kathy took Clare's bicycle to explore the
country.

"You must be an Escoffier when you're in full possession of your
faculties," David said.

"May I have another slice of that delicious gingerbread?"  "It's a bit
overdone.  I've only just started to cook in a convection oven," Clare
said apologetically.

"And it's a bit difficult to manage with no fridge just that metal meat
safe hanging outside the back door.  When I get a job, I'll act a
fridge."  David, who had been briefly told about the flight from Sam,
joked, "You might try selling gingerbread.  I'd be your first
customer."  Clare laughed.

"What do you do for a living?"

"I'm an architect.  I work in Bath.  Mainly house renovations.  I add
an extension, convert a barn, chop off a couple of wings to make a
house a manageable size that sort of work.  It's always a headache, but
you have to take anything you can get when you're newly qualified."

"I thought of converting the attic," Clare said.

"Making a room for Josh to sleep and play in, with bunks for visiting
children.  This house has only two bedrooms, which isn't ideal., have
a look at the attic, if you like."

"Well ... I can't afford anything yet."

"But you might like to know what's possible, and how much it would
cost?"

"Very much."  In the attic, David said thoughtfully, "As there's a
window, you only need to lead the electrical supply upstairs, lay a
soundproof floor covering cork and insulate the roof."  "It'll have to
wait until I have some money."

After Josh had gone to bed, the three adults spent the evening roasting
chestnuts before the living-room fire.

At ten o'clock, David said, "I must go.  But I'll be back."  At the
front door, he kissed Clare on the tip of her nose, then left.

SATURDAY, 31 DECEMBER 1966 Just after Kathy left for London, David
arrived with a bottle of champagne to spend the day and celebrate New
Year's Eve.  Clare wondered suspiciously why this sensationally
good-looking man seemed not to have any New Year's plans.

At lunch, Josh misbehaved.  He pushed his food off the table and
refused to eat even the cheesecake.

Clare was mortified.  She had so hoped that Josh would like David.

"He's tired," she apologized, and took Josh off for his afternoon nap.
He kicked and screamed, furious that his mother's attention was being
distracted from himself.

Darkness fell early, and it started to snow.  After tea, Clare Pulled
the sitting-room curtains together but didn't switch on the light: she
preferred to watch the firelight flick ws over the walls.  In the
embers of the fire, David n roasted chestnuts for the now
sunny-tempered Josh, 4wtil his bedtime.

When Clare returned from putting Josh to bed, David.",.wordlessly took
her in his arms; they sat on the floor, leaning again st the
broken-backed armchair, and necked ac teenagers.

As David's nose nuzzled the back of her neck, Clare had Xn overwhelming
need to be even closer to him.  She felt as if she were lying naked on
a hot rock, stretching languorously towards the sun.

, As the light of the friendly flames played over their Ices, Clare
felt she was in a dream world where time was uS pended  She felt a
physical longing too strong to resist; she breathed fast and grew a bit
light-headed; she could smell the soft, milky smell of David's body and
the warm wool odour of his sweater; she felt a frenzied yearning.

At midnight, David kissed her gently and left shortly afterwards,
saying he hoped that snow hadn't blocked the ibads.

Disappointed, Clare wondered what had gone wrong.  After all, he
needn't have visited her.  Why hadn't he wanted to stay Of course, she
wouldn't have let him.

WEDNESDAY, 11 JANUARY 1967

"What's so urgent and private that you couldn't discuss it over the
telephone?"  In his study, Adam, wearing a dinner jacket, poured whisky
into a cut-glass tumbler and confronted his brother.

Mike wore black leather biking trousers and a heavy seaman's turtleneck
sweater.  He said, "I've now been waiting two bloody years for my
commission on the Framwell deal."

Mike's agreed commission was two per cent of the purchase price of any
property that Miranda acquired, either directly or indirectly, through
him.  The commission had been correctly paid on all the relevant
purchases except that of Framwells the chain of tobacconist shops which
was easily the biggest deal Mike had handled.

"You'll get your money," Adam said.

"But Framwells was a self-financing deal.  Frankly, the interest we've
had to pay on the loan is very high."

"Fuck that.  It isn't my problem."

"With the greatest respect" Mike knew this phrase meant Adam was
annoyed 'it is your problem, Mike, because no date of payment for
commission was written into your contract.  Legally, I could keep you
waiting a hundred years for the money."

"We didn't have a contract.  You wrote the arrangement on a sheet of
paper over dinner, and we both signed it.  Here it is!"  Mike pulled a
paper from his pocket and looked at it.  No period of payment was
mentioned.

"If you're going to be difficult," Adam said, "I suggest that either
you wait for a hundred years or agree to reduce the amount payable, by
half."  Mike looked at Adam in astonishment.

"You're my brother, you bastard!  Brothers aren't supposed to fuck each
other over!  You use me when it suits you, you get me to fix your dirty
work" "If you didn't do it, there are plenty of others who would."

"You ruthless, evil bastard."  Mike, furious, could see that Adam
clearly felt he had nothing to fear from his little brother.  Adam
stopped now to light a cigarette, contemptuously confident of his
ability to manoeuvre and control.

"Kindly remember that I provide the legal know-how to protect you and
your friends," Adam said calmly.

"I'll peak to Miranda about your payment.  I'll see if I can 4wry
it."

"I'll damn well speak to Miranda myself," Mike growled.

Adam looked up sharply from his cigarette.

"No.  Don't do that.  It isn't necessary!"

Mike suddenly realized what had happened.

"Miranda thinks she settled this bill months ago, doesn't she?"  he
yelled.

"What did you do?  Forge my name on the back of the cheque and endorse
it to yourselff Mike saw a fleeting guilty look in Adam's eyes before
his lids were lowered and his attention seemingly focused again on his
gold lighter.

"No doubt you told yourself that you were only borrowing my money to
pay your bloody gambling debts, but I call that theft!"  Mike
thundered.

Coolly Adam ground out his cigarette on the hearth.  Adam's apparent
lack of concern enraged Mike, as hurt by his brother's treachery as he
was by the theft.  He wanted to hurt Adam.  He wanted to feel his fist
bruise flesh, smash bone, draw blood.

His fist shot out.  Adam stumbled backward, tripped over the steel
fireplace screen, then lost his balance and crashed to the floor.  As
Adam fell, Mike heard the sound of his head hitting the elaborate steel
fender.  It happened so fast that Mike was left with his arm still
outstretched, towards the dinner jacketed body of his brother.

Immediately contrite, Mike crouched by Adam and lifted his head: it
lolled sideways.  Mike's face was very pale.

IChrist, thought Mike, I can't have killed him, not just with one lousy
punch ... could I?  He knew that only a very good fighter a much better
fighter than he was could knock a man unconscious with one punch to the
jaw.  "Hastily Mike pulled at Adam, until he lay full length on the
rug.  He tore Adam's tie loose, undid his shirt and collar, and stuck
his finger in Adam's mouth to check that his tongue was free.  He
grabbed the telephone and dialled 999.  He knew that the housekeeper
wasn't in, because Adam had opened the front door.

After the fourth ring, the emergency operator answered: "Police, fire,
or ambulance?"  "Ambulance!  Fast!"  After giving full address details,
Mike ran to the kitchen for water and a towel.  How could he have hit
his brother, the only person in the world with whom he felt fully
relaxed, happy, and at home?

As he swabbed his brother's temples with cold water, Mike muttered,
"I'm sorry.  I can't tell you how sorry I am, Adam.  My bloody temper
again!  Look, forget the money.  Just, for God's sake, open your eyes.
Please."

Adam's eyelids moved slightly.  Mike carefully wiped his face.

Adam looked up and said weakly, "God, my head's splitting.  What happen
ed?"  He tried to lift his head, but the room tilted.  Giddy, he fell
back on the rug.  With eyelids still closed, he murmured anxiously,
"Where's my watch?"  "It's still on your wrist, old boy," said Mike,
dabbing with the towel at his brother's face.

"An ambulance is on its way should be here any minute."

Adam slowly lifted his left wrist and looked at it.  Puzzled, Mike
wondered what was so special about that ordinary-looking Omega watch.

Adam said weakly, "I don't need an ambulance ... You hit me, that's
all.  You're not Superman .. . I'll be okay in the morning."

FRIDAY, 20 JANUARY 1967

Just after six o'clock, Clare heard the squeak of the garden gate
hinge.  Her heart jumped.  She caught her breath, dropped her oven
gloves to the floor, and leapt to the window.  David was walking up the
garden path, half an hour earlier than expected.

As he came through the kitchen door, he said, "I'll oil that gate for
you tomorrow when we clear the garden ... Mmm, what's that delicious
smell?"  He took her in his arms.

"Leek-and-potato stew."  Clare's newfound, short-term leisure meant
that she now enjoyed cooking instead of seeing it as an added, rushed,
three-times-a-day chore to fit in around earning her living.  She
mumbled against David's tweed jacket, "We're having chicory-and-orange
salad with vinaigrette sauce, followed by mushroom croustade with a
hazelnut topping, then Stilton and homemade oatmeal biscuits."

"Sounds delicious."  He kissed the top of her head.

"By the way, are you a vegetarian?"  "Only since last week.  I decided
I don't like eating dead bodies not after being caught in a trap.  I
know most people think it's cranky."  Clare served supper early so that
four-year-old Josh could stay up late and eat with them.  She would
have preferred a romantic candlelit dinner for two, but even more, she
wanted Josh to see David as one of life's pluses and not as an
interloper.

After Josh had gone to bed, they again sat on a rug before the fire
with their backs to the broken-backed armchair, holding hands as they
listened to a radio concert.

Clare murmured, "There's something I have to tell you."  She had
carefully thought out what she was going to say, but when, in the
firelight, she looked into his dark fringed eyes, she forgot her
rehearsed words.  She sighed and said regretfully, "You're so
good-looking."

"I know what you mean.  I hate it.  It's embarrassing.  And believe me,
it's a drawback.  Women are distracted and men don't trust me because
of my looks," David said.

"But there's nothing I can do about it.  I wear my hair long and I comb
it forward to hide as much as possible of my face.  I used to wear
clear glass spectacles, although I didn't need them."  He added, "But
there is one great advantage: nobody wants to fight me.  Sometimes if
I'm sitting in a bar, I'm teased by strangers, who think I'm a
homosexual.  Then I slowly stand up, and they see the length of me and
back away.  They're not to know I'd never fight."  He laughed
apologetically.

"I also have some cranky principles."  Clare didn't laugh.  Instead,
she said what she had to say, knowing that this was the time to get it
out.

"David, I find you almost unbearably attractive.  I love feeling close
to you.  But I don't want to go to bed with you.  I want to make that
clear!"

"Why not?"  David settled his arm more comfortably around her.

Clare lost her nerve.  She had intended to say, "Because I went through
a promiscuous period after I left Sam, and it was a hateful, shameful,
humiliating time, and I'll never let it happen again."  She also feared
that early sexual disaster in this relationship would doom it.

But Clare forgot her lines; instead, she burst into tears.

"Because my love life has been such a mess!"

"Well, that's in the past," David murmured as he cuddled her.

"But what happen ed?"  Clare snuffled a bit.

"Sex isn't what I was led to expect."  David said, "Sex without a close
emotional relationship doesn't work for me either.  I can't separate
sex from oldfashioned feelings like love and affection."

"But that's what women usually say!"

"You know, Clare, what I like about you is your innocence.  Maybe what
I'm saying is the only sure-fire, tried and tested way to get a girl's
knickers off in thirty seconds which, by the way, it is.  But what I
said is the way I feel."  "I know why you're so easy to talk to," Clare
said.

"You don't bother to try and prove yourself.  You really listen to what
I say and you respond to it.  My husband didn't take me seriously."

"And you haven't had another relationship since?"  Clare hesitated,
then took the plunge.

"I had a ghastly series of one-nighters.  Usually they hopped on and
pumped away and suddenly it was over.  I never climaxed and I was too
shy and too timid to ask for what I wanted, so afterwards I'd be
resentful..

"But if you never told them what turned you on, how could you expect "I
agree, it seems crazy.  I wasn't too shy to leap into bed with them,
but I was too shy to tell them what I needed."

"How you feel is how you feel and how you climax is how you climax, and
so long as you let a man know those things, there shouldn't be a
problem," David said.  They settled down to some serious kissing.

-FRIDAY, 27 JANUARY 1967

The following Friday evening, after spinach souffle, baked potatoes
with sour cream, and rather a lot of excellent claret, Clare found
herself sitting naked to the waist in the firelight.

"Let's go to bed," she whispered.

"Promise you won't anticipate?"

"What?"  No anxious thoughts."

"Such asTI hope I'm going to come ... I hope my body's as good as his
other girls'..  . I hope I don't take much longer..."  Shyly Clare
added, "I hope he isn't bored or tired ... he'll be disappointed if I
don't come .. ."  I "Hell, it's all too much trouble.  I'm not going to
come.

I'll fake it."

Clare nodded.  David stood up and pulled her to her feet.  Hand in
hand, they moved upstairs to bed.

CHAPTER 20

MONDAY, 19 MARCH 1967

"Oh my God, darling, I'd forgotten I ever signed thaW Miranda looked
with dismay at the document that Adam had just placed on her white
horseshoe-shaped desk.  She suddenly felt as cold as the raw wind of
March that swept the streets of London outside her office window.

Adam stared thoughtfully at Miranda; he leaned across her desk.

"I've spent a long, long time thinking about this.  Of course, I know
you won't like giving up fifteen per cent of the total equity of SUPPLY
KITS nobody would.  On the other hand, it was on this condition that I
joined your company: you agreed that should your business ever go
public, I would hive fifteen per cent of the equity for the nominal sum
of fifteen thousand pounds.  I would like to hold you to your, bargain,
Miranda."

"But I thought that only referred to KITSV Miranda said, dismayed.

"The wording of the document clearly states, and or any other
businesses that arise from this company."  That means fifteen per cent
of SUPPLY KITS Miranda.  Surely you read the document before signing
iff "But, darling..."  Miranda looked pleading.

Regretfully Adam shook his head.

"This is not a personal matter, it's a matter that concerns your
business integrity.  What made me finally decide to insist on this was
when I realized that had you been a man, Miranda,or had I not been
personally involved with you, I wouldn't have hesitated to ask for
these shares."  From opposite sides of the desk, they stared at each
other impersonally.  It was as if a glass wall had gone up between
them.  Miranda said quietly, "In that case, Adam, I'd like to get a
second legal opinion."

"Of course.  But you'd better inform Freddy Swanson immediately that
there is a problem.  After all, it's only two days to the flotation."

"Why the hell didn't you bring this up before now?"  Miranda fumed.

"I've only just reached my decision," Adam said softly.  He hadn't
intended to give her time to try a countermove.

Miranda telephoned her lawyer.  Having ascertained that she would,
indeed, be forced to sell fifteen per cent of SUPPLY KITS to Adam for
a.token amount, she added, "In that case, please rewrite my will and
delete all reference to Adam Grant.  Instead, reapportion those shares
to my staff ... No, I've had a better idea!  Add Adam Grant's bequest
to that of Buzz I mean, Miss Doris Mann."  Miranda replaced the
receiver and called for her secretary.

"June, please cancel all today's appointments.  Ask Mr.  Swanson if he
would be kind enough to see me here, as soon as possible.  I mean
within the hour."  Miranda's ten-man board of directors had recently
been expanded to include a new chairman, the Earl of Brighton, and
Frederick Swanson of Seligman Swanson, the merchant bank chosen to hand
lethe SUPPLY KITS flotation.  The bank had organized everything
concerning the various consultants, the share price, and the prospectus
a forty page glossy volume about the company's structure, trading
situation, and future plans.  As was customary.  in Britain, existing
contractual obligations had been included; as was also customary, two
weeks before the flotation, the essential details of this prospectus
had been published in national newspapers.

Mr.  Swanson arrived at the reception area and was shown "to the
private lift that went straight to Miranda's office on the top floor.

When he stepped out, he was astonished by his first view of the place.
The entire sixty-foot room was white, including the marble floor.  The
furniture was white and chrome, and even the many vases of spring
flowers were white.  The space looked clean, glamorous, and exciting.
At the far end of the room, spotlights shone on white tables, upon
which cosmetics, in various stages of testing, were spread.  Overriding
the scent of flowers was the faint suggestion of a peculiar smell,
slightly reminiscent of a school science lab, but fruitier.

Miranda walked forward to welcome her visitor.

"Good morning, Freddy."

"What's happen ed?"  Freddy Swanson asked.  He was pleased by the
progress of the flotation: SUPPLY KITS was thriving; KITS had
sacrificed its 1966 profit only to facilitate the other company's
expansion.  I Swiftly Miranda outlined her problem, grateful for once
that her personal involvement with Adam was a secret.

"Why did A da wait until so late?"

Freddy thundered.

"An undisclosed stock option worth three hundred thousand pounds throws
out all your figures!  That means our brochure and advertisements are
inaccurate."

"Originally he decided not to take up the option because kc thought it
would upset me," Miranda said lamely.

"But Adam eventually decided that he couldn't afford such sentimental
generosity."

"Which, of course, did upset you."

"To be frank, Freddy, he's earned it.  I doubt SUPPLY KITS would be
going public without him."

"Nevertheless, Adam's a qualified lawyer," Freddy said, "yet he put his
name to a prospectus which says that all material information has been
disclosed but does not mention a fifteen per cent stock option that I
wasn't told about."  He sat down on a white, tulip-shaped chair.

"I'll calculate the exact figures," he murmured.

"Adam has acquired one hundred and ninety-two thousand thirty.-shilling
shares worth two hundred and eighty-eight thousand pounds for fifteen
thousand pounds, which leaves you, Miranda, holding sixty per cent of
the shares."  Slowly he looked up from his calculations.

"I suppose we can't do anything about it at this stage.  All the
expensive consultants" work has been done, all the donkey work is over,
everyone is exhausted, and some of the public have already applied for
the shares, so very reluctantly I will take no action.  Those shares
mustn't be sold to Adam until after the flotation.

Everyone in the office noticed the new, impeccably polite coldness
between Miranda and Adam.  Nobody guessed the reason.  But Miranda felt
exposed and lonely.

Early on the following Thursday morning, she grabbed the pale pink copy
of the Financial Times from her breakfast tray.  SUPPLY KITS was now on
the London Stock Exchange: the share price had risen to thirty-three
shillings.  As Miranda poured her coffee, she realized that checking
the share price would now be her first priority every morning.  She was
no longer the proprietor of SUPPLY KITS but the managing director and
major shareholder of a public company.

For a moment, Miranda's eyes sparkled: the little sister number three
in the nursery to whom no one had paid much attention, was now, at the
age of twenty-six, clearly a number one in the business world!  She was
one of the few self-made women in Britain.  In the world!  She
remembered her early unsuccessful struggles for equal treatment and
wondered what her sisters would think of this news.  To hell with
equality now.

She wished she could share her glee with Adam.  Miranda hated the
coldness between them.  Perhaps she should not have been so aggressive.
After all, she had agreed to the 38o when she wanted Adam to join the
company: he 51 only taking what he was entitled to.

Hearing a knock, Miranda turned her head to the door as the housekeeper
entered; she carried a Victorian brass birdcage, in which was a dove.
Attached to the ring at the top of the cage was an olive branch with
silvery-grey leaves.

She tore open the card.  Adam's angular black hand- Wnfing read: "Can I
tell you tonight how sorry I arnT Miranda threw back her sheets and
took the cage to the She laughed as she watched the dove soar above the
chestnut trees, which were already showing the first flecks of green.

I,."Ilmt evening Miranda ran down the stairs to her drawing room, ker
heart was beating hard and she was short of th.

Adam, in white dinner jacket, turned from the window and stared.

"Darling, are you dressed or undressed?  One ia ever knows these days."
Miranda wore a sheer cream thiffon Grecian gown with thonged gold
sandals that crisscrossed to her knees.

"Definitely dressed.  It's Zandra Rhodes."

"That dress was designed to be taken off."  Adam held Iter by the
shoulders; through the gauze, he could feel her Warm flesh.  As he
pulled her against his body, she breathed in -kis body scent and felt
his excitement.

"How I've missed you."  he murmured as his hands slowly moved down her
Uck and then traced the swell of her buttocks.

Hungrily Miranda groped for his body; her knees shook i4d, together,
they fell upon the thick cream carpet, where, Wordlessly, they came
together again.

Towards dawn, Miranda no longer knew whether or not Ac was dreaming, as
she felt Adam's flesh against hers and inhaled the pungent almond smell
of love; by the dying embers of the drawing-room fire, she could just
see his face.

Sleepily Adam whispered, 11 find it an extraordinarily erotic idea."

"What?"  "To be in bed with a self-made millionairess."

"But we aren't in bed, darling."

"Let's get there quickly.  There are things I must do to you."

SATURDAY, 19 AUGUST 1967

Outside, the sun beat down on the red baked earth of Provence, but the
summer salon was cool.  A Scrabble board lay on the floor, a reminder
that so far this year Buzz was beating Elinor by 147 to 17.  Miranda,
in black linen shorts and halter top, lay with her feet up on the terra
cotta-coloured sofa, enjoying her idleness.  She yawned and stretched;
she wished her siesta could have lasted until the following morning no,
the following week.

The SUPPLY KITS interim dividend had been seven per cent an excellent
figure but in spite of this satisfying result, Miranda still fretted
about her neglect of KITS.  After the SUPPLY KITS flotation, the
analysts, investors, and competitors had taken a much closer look at
the company.  An exhausted Miranda found that instead of having more
time, she had almost a full-time job keeping present and future
shareholders informed and happy: she prepared official reports, gave
institutional and pension-fund presentations, attended city lunches,
and made time in her overfilled schedule for the financial press.
Overworked and depressed, she felt as if she were being turned into a
glamorous business machine.

Miranda sniffed the heavy scent of the lilies; in the flower room
beyond the bar, she could hear Elinor and Buzz talking as they made
their way slowly into the summer salon.  A maid arrived with the tea
tray as soon as they sat down.

"Cucumber sandwiches."  Buzz nodded approvingly.

"And chocolate eclairs."  Miranda yawned again.

"Buzz, I can't understand how you can eat anything after these huge,
delicious French lunches.  The others are still working it off on the
tennis court."

"Not me."  Adam sauntered into the room.

The maid put down the tea tray and fished in the pocket of her dress.
Vne lettre par courier pour Mademoiselle Mann."

"For meT Buzz was puzzled.

"Nobody sends me letters by courier.  An American stamp .. ."  As she
turned the letter over, her face became eager and younger.

"It's Bertha Higby!"

Since the death of her fiance nearly fifty years ago, Buzz had
continued to correspond with his mother.  Every year, Ginger's parents
travelled to France to visit his grave, sometimes accompanied by Buzz. 
Now eighty-seven years old and recently widowed, Mrs.  Higby remained
in Cleveland.

Buzzreadthe short letter.  "Oh!  ... Oh ... But I couldn't..

"What is it?  Elinor asked, teapot suspended.

"Eric left a bigger windfall than Bertha expected.  She says at her
age, she might not have long to enjoy it.  She says she's spent her
life living modestly, as Eric wanted, b t now she wants to blow a bit
of it on some fun ... Strewthl She wants to take a luxury winter cruise
... next "January ... Six weeks on the Stella Polaris.  Round the
Caribbean islands and South America, until the end of February ... and
she wants me to be her guestf "Why did she send it by courier?" 
Miranda asked, "She wants a quick reply, to book our passages."

"Then why didn't she telephone?"  "Such extravagance!  Eric would turn
in his urn.  Anyway, "i 'tts out of the question.  I couldn't leave
Elinor on her own."

"I don't need a chaperon, you old fool."  Elinor handed Buzz a cup of
strong Indian tea.

"I can do without you for six weeks, Buzz.  Perhaps I'll get a bit of
peace, for a change."

"No.  Six weeks is too long to be away," Buzz said, blowing on her tea
to cool it.

Adam said, "Elinor has five servants here, three secretaries, and a
doctor almost within shouting distance.  Perhaps it's time you had a
real rest, Buzz."

"I agree," said Miranda.

"I don't need a rest."  Buzz was affronted.

"Of course you don't," Adam soothed.

"But I expect Elinor feels that as your friend is eighty-seven, she
probably shouldn't be travelling alone."

"That's for sure," Elinor said seriously.

"A nd I do think you need a rest from me, Buzz.  It's two years since
my ... er ... incident and you've hardly had a day off ever since
you've fussed around me like a mother hen.  How long is it since you've
seen Her thaT "Four years," Buzz said.

"They came for a weekend just before we left Starlings."

"We could easily arrange for a nurse to be here during your absence,"
Adam suggested.

"Fiddlesticks!  I don't need a nurse!"  Elinor said.

"You need somebody," Buzz said firmly.

"And she'll have to sleep in my bedroom because it's nearest to yours."
Elinor smiled at Adam.

"Tell the trustees that Buzz must have a bonus, Adam.  She'll need to
keep her end up on a luxury cruise."

Adam pulled a notebook from his trouser pocket.  As he scribbled, he
said, "By the way, Elinor, Paul Littlejohn has decided to leave STG,
Bermuda.  He's setting up his own firm there."

"What a nuisance!"  Elinor said.

"Why does he want to do th at?"  "For much the same reason as I did. 
I'm afraid that STG no longer as reliable as it was in my grandfather's
day.  I've never regretted leaving.  In fact, it was a great relief."

"Butwho will superintend my work in future?"

Elinor asked.

"That is a problem," Adam admitted, "although, of course, we could
transfer our affairs to Paul's new firm.  We know that he can handle
everything."  Buzz looked- disapproving.

"Why not?"  Adam said casually.

"He could avoid mistakes and the need to brief someone else.  But
there's no need to stake a decision yet.  Paul has to give six months"
notice to STG, so he won't be leaving until well after Christmas
probably in February."

"Plenty of time to think about it carefully," Elinor said.

"Another cup of tea, Buzz?  Tell us more about this cruise."

SATURDAY, 3 FEBRUARY 1968

A week after the affairs of the Dove Trust had been transferred to
Littlejohn and Partners Bermuda, Adam surprised Elinor with .a trip to
Saracen for the weekend.  Every time his plane touched down at Nice
airport and he saw palm trees and tanned porters in white,
short-sleeved shirts, Adam enjoyed afresh the glamour of a life where
one stepped on to a plane in bleak winter weather and shortly
afterwards stepped off in warm sunshine.

That evening, he and Elinor drank aperitifs in the summer salon.

Adam pointed to a pair of elaborately carved chairs in
cinnamon-coloured wood, inset with ivory.

"Are those newT "Yes.  Found them at my pet antiques dealer in Cannes.
Eighteenth century, from Goa, made for some rich Portuguese trader.  I
also snapped up those two new chairs in the kall the ones with angels"
faces carved on the back: really too good for family use, but I
couldn't resist them."

"What did they cost?"  "Too much to tell you, dear boy," said Elinor
gaily.  As Adam refilled his glass, Elinor said, "I never realized how
much I'd miss Buzz.  How she'll crow when I tell her!  She's obviously
having a wonderful time.  Every day, I get a postcard from some
tropical place called Brown Sugar Island or Crab Cove.  She says there
are no men on board the ship is full of hopeful widows but the crew are
wonderful and she's friendly with the purser, who dances a mean
Charleston."

Adam sipped his drink.

"As well as a winter break, there's another reason for my visit,
Elinor, but I didn't want to alarm you unnecessarily by discussing it
over the telephone."  Elinor sensed trouble.

"It's the new book contract," Adam went on.

"The publishers would feel ... happier ... if they had a medical all
clear before signing.  They know it's been over two years since your
illness, but they'd appreciate reassurance.  They're all overjoyed
about it, but before they make their plans and get the sales force
excited, they want to be ... quite sure ... that you are ... completely
fit."

"It's not as though I were writing a new book," Elinor said crossly.

"The boxed set is a reissue."

"Yes, but you agreed to promote it, "Adam said patiently

"And before they spend vast sums on the publicity launch, they'd like
to know that it won't be too much for you."

"I feel fit as a fiddle," Elinor protested.

"Elinor, this is a reasonable business precaution to take," Adam
persisted.

"Film stars, sports stars everyone in businesses where heavy investment
depends on the health of one person know that a regular medical check
is considered a reasonable and professional precaution."  Adam knew
that Elinor would go to great lengths to avoid being called
unprofessional.

0k, well, if it's only a medical check, I can go to that eric an
nursing home at Cannes."

"They'd prefer British medical reports."

"Oh dear.  How long will it tak eT "Perhaps four days."

"A pity Buzz isn't here.  Although she'd only fuss if she She doesn't
like the London Clinic.  Noisy place, she thinks."

"You can be there and back before Buzz returns," Adam Said.

"And you needn't go to the London Clinic.  I'll arrange for the best
possible care.  As you say, you aren't ill so your friends will be able
to visit you.  Life will be one long party, with a matron to shoo
people away, should you get tired or bored.  And the night you leave,
I'll take you to the theatre."

"You make it sound quite fun, dear boy.  Could you see that there are a
few crates of champagne those half bottles so convenient for
visitors."

"I'll arrange everything," Adam promised.

SATURDAY, 10 FEBRUARY 1968

One week later, as the plane took off from Nice for London airport,
Adam outlined his arrangements to Elinor.

"Eastbourne!"

she exclaimed.

"Why Eastbourne?"

"Elinor you sound like Dame Edith Evans saying, "A handbag?"  in Ac
Importance of Being Earnest.  Eastbourne isn't the Gorbals," Adam said
easily.

"Eastbourne has the highest sunshine rate in Britain."

"I can get plenty of sunshine at Saracen.  And I'm not on any last legs
yet, thank you very much!  Eastbourne is filled with nursing homes in
Victorian mansions with names like "The Gables"."

"And that is why the best specialists for this sort of mediad check-up
are in Eastbourne," Adam said persuasively.

"It's only for a few days, Elinor, and it's just an hour and a half
away from London.  There will be plenty of flowers and books, delicious
food, TV and a telephone..."  Elinor pursed her lips.

"You should not have made these arrangements without my approval,
Adam!"

Adam looked contrite.  He said, "I can, of course, cancel them should
you wish, but Sir George is undoubtedly the best-qualified heart
specialist in the country.  And he himself told me that the Lord
Willington Nursing Home is the most professional of the local nursing
homes.  Dr.  Craig Dunlop who owns it, prides himself on having all the
latest equipment."

"Oh well, I suppose it won't hurt me for a couple of days.  Stop
fretting, dear boy."  With the South Downs behind it and the turbulent
grey English Channel in front, the Lord Willington Nursing Home looked
like a country mansion.  As she stepped from her Rolls, Elinor shivered
in the unaccustomed raw air of February.

Inside, a faint whiff of disinfectant was almost overpowered by the
heavy scent emanating from bowls of blue, hyacinths.  A smiling
receptionist apologized for the matron's absence.

After Elinor had signed her voluntary consent form, she and Adam were
taken to her suite of rooms.  But for the mechanical hospital bed, she
might have been in a firstclass hotel: the sitting room was agreeably
furnished in eau-de-Nil, the bedroom in old rose; the interconnecting
rooms faced the sea over lawns and flower beds, though they were bleak
at this time of the year.

Elinor read the cards from two identical large vases of" lilies which
took up all the space on the dressing table.  She laughed.

"One is from Miranda, one from Annabel.  They both know I love
lilies."

Adam smiled.

"Miranda wanted to be with you today, but Dr.  Craig-Dunlop wants you
to settle in quickly, with no excitement.  Your tests start tomorrow.
Miranda wants to know as soon as you're allowed visitors.  Annabel has
already telephoned three times, but I've asked her not to call again,
in case she disturbs a treatment.  It's best if you call her."  Coffee
was served in the sitting room right after their arrival.  Then a
smiling procession of medical staff presented themselves, each of whom
told Elinor that if there was anything she wanted, she had only to ask.
Finally she was given an enormous burgundy leather bound folder that
looked like some medieval city charter: it was the menu.

"Don't worry, dear boy," Elinor said over a glass of champagne poured
from one of the little bottles.

"I can see they're going to look after me really well."

"I'm sure of it."  Adam smiled as he lifted his glass in a toast.

On the following day, Elinor's door was thrown open by a nurse who then
stood to attention as, smiling benignly, Matron Ivy Braddock appeared
in the doorway.

Elinor's first astonished impression was that Matron Braddock looked
like a female impersonator a sergeant or in drag: she couldn't wait to
describe her to Buzz.  The matron was one of the biggest women Elinor
had ever "ieen; her neck seemed sunk between strong shoulders, and red
hands hung from beefy arms.  Her face looked rough-hewn, as if carved
from a cliff.  Her yellow hair was cut very short, and on it, like a
cake frill, perched a nurse's cap, tied beneath the square jaw.  The
matron moved towards Elinor's bed on legs that seemed to be joined to
her feet without ankles: she did not walk so much as stomp.  We going
to do everything we can, Mrs.  O'Dare, to make you comfortable."
Matron Braddock's voice was surprisingly light and pleasant.

First, blood and urine samples were taken; then Elinor was X-rayed,
after which she spent the rest of the day being wired up to various
machines for tests.  That eve ming Dr.  Cyril Craig-Dunlop stopped in
just to visit.  He was a small, mild-manner cd man with surprisingly
beautiful, black-fringed grey eyes.

The next morning, the heart specialist, Sir George, was ushered into
Elinor's bedroom by Matron Braddock.  Elinor hated to be interrupted:
she was reading Truman Capote's In Cold Blood.

Other specialists followed.  On the third morning, Dr.  Craig-Dunlop
again visited Elinor.

"I've had the results of nearly all the tests," he said, which are more
or less what we expected.  However, as you know, you must be very, very
careful with the few years that remain to you."  In Cold Blood fell to
the floor.  Elinor sat upright.

"What do you mean?  I have recovered completely!  That's what I was
told!"

Dr.  Craig-Dunlop stammered, clearly confused, "I - I'm so sorry, Mrs.
O'Dare.  I assumed you were the type of patient who would have been
told ..

"Told what?"  "The truth about your condition," Dr.  Craig-Dunlop said
apologetically.

"The few years that remain to me?  Are you sur eT Elinor blanched, her
pallor more obvious against her peach chiffon robe.

"I'd like a second opinion."  Dr.  Craig-Dunlop coughed.

"Your three specialists are all of the same opinion."  Elinor stared
bleakly out of the window, beyond the sloping lawn to where the
sludge-coloured sea met with the grey sky.  There was no sound in the
room.

Eventually she said, "I don't want my granddaughters to know.  They
would worry, you see."  Shortly after the doctor left, a smiling nurse,
smart in a lavender-and-white-striped uniform, entered; she carried two
pills in a small vial.

"This will make you feel better."  She watched to make sure that Elinor
swallowed the medication.  The nurses were well trained in dealing with
rich patients who were used to doing as they pleased and often disliked
accepting the discipline of routine; they knew that the very old, the
alcoholics, and the more than slightly batty patients called
'eccentric' had to be carefully supervised.  This old dear, who was to
be kept under heavy sedation, clearly didn't know that she was a
long-term patient, being treated for depression.

During the next two days, Elinor slept a lot, which Dr.  Craig-Dunlop
said might be because she wished to evade reality.  But the reason was
simply that Elinor was very sensitive to medicine; for her, a normal
dose of sedative was an overdose.

In a moment of clarity, just before her eleven a.m. medication on
Friday, a bewildered Elinor threatened to leave and was told by a nurse
that this was not possible without the prior permission of the
matron.

Elinor, used to prompt obedience to her wishes, flew into a rage, of
which the nurse took not the slightest notice.  An injection was
swiftly administered, and Sister correctly reported that' the patient
had become uncontrollable and needed sedation.

"Paranoia," Dr.  Craig-Dunlop said quietly to Matron upon reading this
report.

Matron Braddock nodded.  She knew that a classic symptom of paranoia
was the suspicion that those who were caring for you were trying to
harm you.

SATURDAY, 17 FEBRUARY 1968

After Elinor had spent a week in the nursing home, Annabel and Miranda
were allowed to visit.  On the way, sitting in the back of the Bentley
that drove them from London, the two worried sisters spoke little.
Finally, Miranda inquired after Scott.

Annabel snapped, "Don't ask me how Scott is!  I hardly ever see him I
don't even suppose he's noticed that I'm not there this week!"

"What do you mean?"  Miranda was surprised.

"Oh, he's too wrapped up in his work to bother about his wife.  He even
forgot our tenth anniversary!"

"That doesn't sound like Scott."

"Well, he would have forgotten," Annabel amended, "but I reminded
him."

Annabel and Miranda were shocked by their grandmother's appearance: her
golden hair was lifeless, her eyes were dull, her speech was thick and
slurred, she seemed inert and limp.  Forewarned by the matron to treat
her normally and to ignore anything eccentric that she did or said, the
two sisters immediately wrapped Elinor in an invisible cloud of
affection.

Afterwards, in the matron's office, where Adam and Dr.  Craig-Dunlop
were waiting for them, Annabel burst into tears.

"I can't understand why I couldn't see that she was ill."  Miranda put
her arms around her sister.

"Don't cry, Frog.  I had no idea either.  It's lucky she's being
properly looked after."

"Oh, what bad luck that Buzz was away!"  Annabel sobbed.

"She could have been here with Gran."

"What exactly is paranoia?"  Miranda impatiently asked the doctor.

"We prefer to describe it as a personality disorder," he said.

"A chronic, slowly progressive mental disorder.  In this case, I fear
that there will be delusions of persecution."

"What treatment is she having?"  Miranda asked while Annabel wept.

"She is being given a drug called Mellaril.  And sedatives as
necessary."

"How long will she be ill?"

There was a short, ominous silence.

"How lone."  Miranda repeated shrilly.

"I cannot say.  Not yet.  We'll have to see how she responds to
treatment, but it may take quite a long time."

"How many week sT "Perhaps you should think in terms of months," Dr.
Craig-Dunlop said gently.  He added, "But I must emphasize that at this
stage we simply cannot tell.  She is an elderly lady, she has had one
stroke, and she has a personality disorder.  We simply cannot say what
will happen."

"How can she have deteriorated so seriously in such a short time, when
she only came here for a check-up?"  Miranda persisted.

"It was extremely fortunate that she came here when she did," said the
doctor gravely, "or her situation might have been much more serious."
Over a depressing hotel lunch of beige roast beef and sour cabbage,
Miranda asked, "Why didn't you tell us, Ada mT "I didn't want to cause
you unnecessary anxiety until Dr.  Craig-Dunlop and the specialist
consultants had reached a definite conclusion."  In front of Annabel,
Adam was careful to speak to Miranda formally and without endearment.
Although many people suspected them to be lovers, Adam still insisted
on secrecy.

"But we can't leave Gran in that place," Miranda said.

"She must come to London where we can get the best medical advice, and
I can look after her."

"She seems to be getting very good care where she is.  The sea air is
bracing, and you wont find a London nursing home in acres of garden,
like this one," Adam said.

"But if you want further opinions, we can go to any London consultant
you choose."

"Why can't Gran go back to Saracen when Buzz returns and be nursed the
re?"  Annabel pushed aside her untouched plate.

"She loves Saracen."

"That might be a bit too heavy a load for Buzz," Adam suggested.

"Remember how she knocked herself out after Elinor had her stroke?
Round-the-clock nursing, such as Elinor is getting here, would mean
overseeing four nurses, organizing their schedules, plus providing
meals, transport and the rest of it."

"We don't want Buzz ill as well," Miranda agreed.

"I've telephoned Dr.  Montand at Saracen," Adam continued.

"He agrees that the best place for Elinor is an English nursing home
where she can get round-the-clock medical care if necessary.  In any
case, Dr.  Craig-Dunlop is adamant that, for the moment, she must be
under proper medical super-vision for twenty-four hours a day, in case
her condition deteriorates rapidly."  Both sisters looked alarmed at
the thought of possible further deterioration.  Both were glad of
Adam's presence.  He was always so comforting in times of trouble.

"If you're sure this is the best place .. ."  Annabel said
hesitantly.

Miranda said, "Firstly, I'd like to be sure that a nursing home is the
best place for her, rather than a hospital.  Secondly, if she's likely
to ... be like this for some time, that the Lord Whatsit is the best
nursing home available."

Annabel nodded in agreement.  From his briefcase, Adam produced a sheaf
of coloured brochures for nursing homes.  Silently he handed them to
the two sisters.

Miranda looked at the imposing exteriors and the bleak interiors of the
nursing and residential homes.

"These reception rooms look like pub lounges.  Gran wouldn't put a maid
in one of these bedrooms!  I'm sure they're comfortable but they look
so deeply unattractive."

Annabel read aloud, ""Each bedroom has a fitted hand basing  Big deal.
No private bathrooms."

"Elinor has her own bathroom at the Lord Willingtorn," Adam pointed
out.

"But these other places have a certain number of amenities
physiotherapist, chiropodist, hairdresser."  ""Singsongs and
sideshows'P Annabel read.  ""Bingo-P "I brought only the most
attractive brochures, "Adam said.

"I hate to think what the others are like," Annabel said.

"But look at the prices they chargeP "Gran could practically live at
the Ritz for what the Lord Whatsit is costing," Miranda pointed out.

Adam said in a stiff voice, "I went to considerable trouble to choose
the best place, so naturally it isn't cheap.  But you're welcome to
move her if you wish."

The sisters looked at each other and shook their heads.

"It's not the nursing home we hate," Annabel acknowledged.

"It's what's happened to Gran that we can't bear.."

"We must find Clare and tell her straight away."  Miranda did not look
forward to this.

Adam coughed.  "I must warn you that any mention of Clare agitates your
grandmother.  I really feel that her wishes must be respected- Elinor
clearly doesn't wish to see Clare."

SUNDAY, 18 FEBRUARY 1968

Standing barefoot in her pink-sprigged Laura Ashley nightgown, Clare
looked from her bedroom window at the quietly falling snow.  The moon
dimly lit the woods, faintly etched against the hill behind Applebank
Cottage.

She shivered, jumped back into bed, and snuggled lower under the
patchwork quilt.  In half an hour it would be time to take her loaves
out of the oven: the only drawback to her new business was that it
meant getting up early every single morning of the year.  Because her
business had long outgrown the kitchen, David had drawn plans to
convert the outhouse into a proper bakery.

Clare had accidentally metamorphosed into a baker ten months before,
when David took some of her homebaked bread to friends who lived
nearby: they asked if they could buy bread regularly from her.  Why
not?  she thought, and packed a sample treacle cake and some shortbread
with her first order.

One month later, Clare had tacked a plastic-covered price list to her
back door and another to the garden gate.  She now baked rye bread,
whole-grain bread, soda bread, and date bread; pasties, rich chocolate
cake, rum-flavoured fruitcake, brandy snaps, and shortbread.  She
cooked fruit flans when fruit was in season.  Clare baked nothing that
could be found at!he local baker and charged what she considered
exorbitant prices, which people seemed happy to pay in cash.

The main reason Clare did not allow credit was because it complicated
her bookkeeping.  Having experienced that particular chaos, she was
careful to keep her books up to date, a simple matter of filling in two
columns each day, "Purchases made" and "Total cash takings'.

IUnder the patchwork quilt, David turned over and sleepily pulled Clare
towards him.  Her nightgown had ridden up around her waist, and she
enjoyed feeling his hard, muscular legs entwined around hers.  Still
half asleep, he kissed her cheek and fumbled beneath her gown, seeking
her breasts.

With a loud crash, the door burst open, and Josh, in yellow Donald Duck
pyJamas, leapt upon the bed.

"Ith thnowing!  Ith thnowing!  David, can I have a th ledge  I'm Old
enough now.  Oh, plea the David sat up, turned on the light, yawned,
and scratched 1111'kis hairy chest.

"You can take a tea tray up to the wood and slide down to the back
garden.  But not now.  It's the middle of the night.  After breakfast."
He turned and smiled at Clare.  "You are going to have breakfast in bed
... No, not a word!  Josh and I planned it yesterday evening, didn't
we, Josh?  After you've taken your loaves out, you're coming back to
bed.  Isn't she, Josh?"  Josh nodded happily.

"There must be a catch," Clare said.

"You're too perfect!"  "Yes, there's a catch," David said quietly as he
made room for Josh in the bed.

Later, David pulled on Clare's to welling bathrobe and led Josh down to
the kitchen.

After twenty minutes, her breakfast tray arrived; upon it was boiling
red soup, chocolate ice cream, and a fizzy orange drink.

David winked over Josh's head.

"Josh chose the menu."

"Delicious," Clare said feebly as she looked into the smiling face and
aquamarine eyes of her son.  She looked down at the tray on her lap.

"That's too much tomato soup just for me.  Perhaps you could help me
eat it, Josh?"  Suddenly Clare's baby was wearing jeans and a navy
nylon anorak, and howling for tough boots like the village boys'.  Now
five years old, he went to school in Warminster and was trying hard to
adopt a Dorset accent, having been teased about the snob way he talked.
Josh liked reading comics, watching TV especially Dr.  Who, and peeing
in his bath when his mother was looking the other way.  He loved soccer
and couldn't remember baseball; neither could he remember California,
except for a vague recollection of sunshine and a white house and what
seemed an enormous swintating pool, although Clare laughed and told
him it had really been quite small for LA.

When Josh had scraped the plates and gone to tea tray down the hill,
David produced another tray with coffee, Clare's own homemade
croissants, and strawberry jam.

After that, huddled under the patchwork quilt, they made love in a
lazy, unhurried way.  This morning Clare felt tender and loving; she
wanted to be close to him.  But sometimes after they made love, she
felt wide awake and energetic, beautiful and happy, strong enough to
lift the stove.

"It's a pity more men aren't like you," Clare murmured.

"You're so sensual.  You enjoy physical intimacy and affectionate
contact as much as women do.  I wish all men enjoyed their whole
bodies, rather than just a little, wobbly bit of it."

"I've always thought the most important sex organ is between the ears,"
David said, kissing hers.

CHAPTER 21

THURSDAY, 29 FEBRUARY 1968

On the last day of February, a suntanned Buzz New into London airport,
wearing Bertha's farewell gift a snappy white Capri pants suit.  She
felt energetic, almost girlish as she left the plane.

To her surprise, a ground hostess met her and took her to a VIP lounge,
where Adam was waiting.

"Something's happened to Elinor?"

Buzz turned white.

Gently Adam told her what had happened.

Buzz was out of the car almost before it rolled to a halt on the gravel
forecourt.  It was an unusually sunny day for the end of February, and
cheerful nurses in scarlet cloaks wheeled or walked their patients
slowly around the garden.

One nurse moved a wheelchair towards her, and Buzz suddenly realized
with a shock that the cocooned creature within it was Elinor.  She
looked small, frail, and feeble; her face was dazed and vacant, as if
she'd just been woken up and couldn't quite remember where she was.

Buzz said, "Hello, Nell."  Elinor did not look up.  In silence, Buzz
listened to the nurse's non-stop starling twitter.

"We've had a good morning, haven't we, Mrs.  O'Dare?  ... We watched
the birds at the birdbath and we fed crumbs to them, didn't we?  ...
Lean forward a bit, dear you've pushed your cushion down again.  There,
that's better, isn't it?  ... Then we had a choccy biccy and the usual
little argument about our nap..  Then we listened to a nice concert on
the radio, didn't weT Slowly Elinor looked up and glared.  Buzz felt
tremulous hope.  She said, "You seem a bit under the weather, Nell.
Don't worry, I'll have you out of here in no time."  In Elinor's over
warm bedroom, Buzz peered at the temperature chart and medical
instructions clipped to the foot of the metal bed.  She frowned when
she saw five different tranquillizers and sedatives listed: no wonder
Nell looked bewildered and depressed.  Buzz recalled Elinor's swift
rage and felt another glimmer of hope, but a thought occurred to her:
If they insisted on treating Nell like a crazy person, she might
actually end up like one.

Peering again at the list of medications, she started to say something
to Elinor, then stopped short, remembering that Adam was in the room.

Buzz turned to him.

"I've a present for Elinor in my hand luggage.  It's in a red box.
Would you mind getting it from the carT She turned back to Elinor and
said in the rather loud, slow, and contrived voice that people use for
the deaf, "I've brought you a surprise, Nell."

As soon as the door closed behind Adam, she whispered, "What have they
done to you, my girl?"  Lying back on her pillows, Elinor slowly shook
her head from side to side but said nothing.

"I'll be back tomorrow," Buzz told her.

"I'll just turn up, without warning.  Until then don't swallow them
pills.  Do you hear me, Nell?"  She leaned forward and shook Elinor's
shoulders.

"Don't swallow them drat ted pills!  Hold lem under your tongue and
play possum.  Then spit 'em into a handkerchief and hide it under the
pillow."

The door opened and Adam came in.

"Just straightening Nell's pillows," Buzz said airily.

As she and Adam left, Buzz turned back to see Elinor silently looking
at the ceiling.

Buzz's gift, a nacre box, lay ignored upon the bedside table; but even
in the dull afternoon light, the shell surface

As their hired limousine purred back to Heathrow airport, Buzz asked,
"Why didn't you let me know she was ill?  They had a radiotelephone
thing on the Stella Polaris."

"Had you been present, Buzz, there was nothing you could have done, so
it was thought best not to disrupt your holiday," Adam explained.  Buzz
noticed he didn't say who had 'thought it best'.  He added sadly, "It's
not yet certain that Elinor will ever again be well enough to live
without nursing support."

"Just as well I know a lot more about nursing than some of these young
Australian madams," Buzz sniffed.

Then Adam quietly explained that she no longer had a job.

Tight-lipped and pale, Buzz listened in silence and near disbelief.
Nobody had ever sacked her!  Even after she had been caught in that
ruined church with Ginger Higby, that old bitch of a commandant in the
women's ambulance service hadn't wanted to lose her.

Eventually she asked, "Does Elinor know about this?"  "Of course not,"
Adam said.

"As you saw, she's in no condition to discuss anything.  But the
trustees have considered the matter most carefully."

"Them trustees are sitting miles away in their offices in Bermuda!"
Buzz snorted.

"I know Nell better than they do!  And better than you do, you young
whippersnapper!"

"Of course you do," Adam said soothingly.

"But in fact, it is Elinor's doctors and consultants who feel that she
will no longer need you.  I thought I had made that plain."  Shocked
and incredulous, Buzz could say nothing more, but as the limousine
glided on, she remembered a great deal: the teashop outings in Earls
Court when Edward was little, comforting Nell, time after time, when
Billy had had a few and behaved badly.  She remembered the
difficulties they'd had repairing Starlings after the war, when you
couldn't get a brick or a plank of wood, not even if you was royalty;
and she remembered comforting Nell as each granddaughter left home.

Now they were kicking her out!  And the worst part was that she
couldn't talk to Elinor about it.

Finally, Buzz stifled her feelings enough to ask calmly, "Do the girls
know about this?"  "They asked me to tell you," Adam lied.

"We all have to face the fact that Elinor's life has suddenly changed
and she will probably continue to deteriorate."

"And they didn't mind me going?"  Buzz asked painfully.

"Of course they mind they're very, very fond of you," Adam said.  As
soon as he'd seen Buzz safely on the plane to Nice, he planned to drive
back to London, where he would telephone Annabel in New York before
seeing Miranda.  The sisters would 'be told that Buzz had agreed it was
best for her to leave.

"Of course them girls are fond of me!"  Buzz bit back further words.
She'd wiped their tears, she'd wiped their hot ties and she'd loved
them as if they were her own.

Adam shrugged his shoulders and said nothing.  Buzz growled, "Where am
I supposed to goT She refused to accept this mortifying disgrace.  Who
did this little twerp think he was?  Too big for his boots, as she'd
always said.  Slowly her face reddened as she fought to control her
anger and her tears.  Eventually her voice grated, "You can't kick me
out like this.  Not after all these years."

"Of course we're not kicking you out."  Adam spoke soothingly, but Buzz
sensed a hint of contempt or was it triumph?  "Then what exactly are
you doing?.

"I am not doing anything.  I have been asked to see that you are
properly looked after in your retirement."  "Retirement?"  I'age of
retirement,"

"You are eight years over the lega

Adam reminded Buzz.

"The trust has approved a generous pension; it will be paid to you
monthly wherever you wish anywhere in the world."  He waved his hand
expansively.

"You make it sound as if I've won a sweepstake!"  she said bitterly,
still fighting to control her feelings.  What was that favourite saying
of Elinor's?  Buzz could almost hear her voice: "Stupidity is the
operation of intelligence hampered by emotion."  Buzz sensed that she
had to be careful, she had to box clever, she had to let Adam think she
had accepted what he said and would go quietly.  Seething with
indignation and fury, she told herself that this was the best way to
catch Adam off guard and discover what was going on.

Thoughtfully Adam said, "It was, perhaps, a pity that you were unable
to stay on with your friend Mrs.  Higby."  Once again Buzz noticed that
Adam didn't speak like other people: he always gave himself an out.
Adam couldn't say, "The cat is black."  He would say, "To the best of
my knowledge, the 'cat appears to be black."  You've got to have the
sense to hold your tongue, my girl, Buzz told herself.  Play along with
him.  Let him think.  that he's able to plant these ideas in your head.
Let him think that he's getting away with it.  She said, J suppose I
could always go and live with Bertha, if Nell really doesn't need
inc."

"Living with Mrs.  Higby might be an excellent idea," Adam approved,
"particularly as eventually it might be necessary to sell Saracen."

"Sell Saracen!  Elinor would never allow it."

"Saracen now belongs to the trust," Adam said firmly.

"If Elinor is unable to live in Saracen, the trustees might consider it
an unjustifiable expense: apart from the income that might be generated
by the capital that's tied up in the place, keeping five full-time
domestic staff members and three secretaries would no longer be viable.
Have you any idea of the cost of running that place, compared to the
cost of a couple of rooms in a nursing ho meT "No idea," Buzz said,
"but I'm sure you know what's best for Nell."  Buzz waited in the
departure lounge.  When the flight to Nice was called, she informed a
brisk blue-uniformed redhead that she was feeling ill and thought she'd
better cancel her ticket.  He took her to the airport nurse, who could
find nothing wrong with her but agreed that she might be suffering from
jet lag and needed only to rest.

An hour later, Buzz hailed a taxi and returned to Eastbourne, where she
booked into a modest residential hotel recommended by the taxi
driver.

Buzz did not feel like sitting in the small lounge at the Eastbourne
hotel, which contained a great many genteel, inquisitive, elderly
ladies, all of whom seemed to be knitting.  She would have liked to go
for a long walk past the charming wedding-cake buildings that -lined
the promCnade, but although it was only teatime, it was already too
dark to see anything.  Instead, she wandered into town, where she
bought a bag of chips, well soused in vinegar and wrapped in newspaper;
she took the bag to her room, where she sat on the edge of the single
bed, slowly eating chips in the dark and thinking.

Buzz decided that her first priority was to see Elinor again.  She
would then telephone Miranda, the most dedsive of the three sisters.

She did not blame herself for going on the cruise, although she sensed
that Adam, always an opportunist, had taken advantage of her absence.
Buzz had read newspaper accounts of old people who had been forcibly
removed from their homes and admitted to nursing homes; such people had
been robbed by the very guardians who were Ily supposed to care for
them.  She had also read about old people's homes that ruthlessly
exploited their pensioners: unscrupulous proprietors grabbed all they
could squeeze from the social services but gave little back to the
residents; they cut corners on staff, food, laundry, and amenities and
added to their profits by pocketing the difference between their sparse
expenditures and the sums they actually received.  If such money
grubbing goings-on could happen in cheap nursing homes that were
checked by the authorities, Buzz wondered what might occur in expensive
ones, where there was a greater possibility for profit?  The Lord
Willington looked the sort of place into which dishonest rascals might
put their inconvenient relations in order to get them out of the way:
uncles with the DTs, incontinent aunts, senile gran dads and cousins
who'd been odd since they were born.  Buzz remembered Nurse Evans,
who'd been with Nell in Ward C at La Chapelle; after the war, Evans had
worked in one of those rich bins before she'd married a Lutheran
minister and gone to live in Scotland.  Evans had relayed some hair
raising stories about the exploitation of her rich patients.

Because for what reason, other than profit, would a nursing home
prescribe so many drugs for Nell?  Did Adam know what was going on?
Buzz didn't know what was going on, but she certainly smelled
dishonesty: it probably involved fraud, and it probably involved
Adam.

Having finished her bag of chips, Buzz licked her fingers, switched the
light on, and prepared for bed.  She had not felt this alone and lonely
since she first set out for the French battlefields over fifty years
ago.

On the following morning, Elinor lay with her eyes closed, apparently
sleeping.  For the past twenty-four hours, she had swallowed none of
her medication, although she had been unable to refuse an injection.
She trusted Buzz.  She knew instinctively that Buzz would reappear to
get her out of this place and help her to recover.

While she lay waiting, Elinor fought back the fears underscored by the
hospital bed and the smell of antiseptic.  Her foremost fear was that
she might lose her mind, for trying to think made her feel as if her
head were filled with cotton wool.  She felt muddled ... couldn't keep
track of one thought for long.  She wasn't ill when she came in here
yes, she was sure of that ... but she was ill now.  How could that have
happened ... unless they were making her ill?  ... How could they do
that?  ... Easy ... with medication.  She feared that decisions were
being made behind her back, and that she was not being told the truth
by that apologetic mouse of a doctor.  Was she really more ill than
she'd been led to suppose?  If so, why hadn't she felt ill?  Or was she
not ill at all?  And if not, then why was she imprisoned here?

It was too difficult.  She would wait for Buzz.  But as she lay there,
demons slid possible visions of the future into her mind.  Suppose she
lost the use of her body?  She dreaded being immobile and physically
dependent, and she certainly felt as if heavy weights were attached to
her feet and her legs; she felt as helpless as if she were buried to
her neck in quicksand.

Another vision slid before her, of a half wit locked in a cell. 
Perhaps she would never again be able to function normally.  She saw
herself wheeled along white corridors, wired up to huge machines that
clicked, whirred, and flashed lights: this was her greatest fear, that
she might be kept alive artificially by machinery, a mumbling
vegetable, after her natural time to die had arrived.

She felt isolated in this comfortable place, but paradoxically, she
also wished that these young women, with their bright faces and inane
chatter, would go away and leave her in peace.

4o6

The next day, the taxi arrived at the nursing home as the dock above
the entrance portico struck ten.  Buzz carefully counted out coins for
the taxi driver, who said, "That ain't much of a tip, lady."

"It's exactly ten per cent," Buzz retorted.

"And what have you done to deserve a tip?  You didn't help me out of
the cab."

"Well, it's snowing."

"Exactly."  Before entering the nursing home, Buzz stood under the
imposing portico and carefully stamped the snow from her shoes.  She
settled the squirrel evening cape that had belonged to her mother on
top of her light summer coat, then walked in and asked to see Mrs.
O'Dare.

The smiling receptionist disappeared.  Smiling Matron Braddock appeared
in her place.  The stocky woman looked intently at Buzz with raised
eyebrows.

"Is Mr.  Grant with you?"  Her voice was light and charming, but her
eyes were hard.

"He usually accompanies visitors.  We don't want Mrs.  O'Dare disturbed
by people she would rather not see."  61 came with Mr.  Grant
yesterday," Buzz reminded the matron.

"And I'm going back to the south of France tomorrow.  I wanted to see
Mrs.  O'Dare once more before I 90.

As Buzz entered her room, Elinor's eyelids slowly opened.

"Hello, Buzz," she whispered, feeling warm relief flood her body.  Now
she could stop worrying.  Buzz would take care of everything.

Buzz settled herself on the upright chair by Elinor's bed, firmly
clasping her old-fashioned handbag on her lap.  The nurse left the
room.

"Can you walk, Nell?"  Buzz whispered back.

"Do you go to the lav by yourselff "Yes," Elinor said weakly.

"They're not going to lay me out yet, you know."

Buzz said, "Soon as my back's turned, look what happens!  That stuff
they're giving you would kill a dozen cats.  But once you're out of
here, I'll have you well in no time.  And I ain't never going away
again."

"Dear, dear Buzz.  But they'll never let me leave.  Not without a fuss.
I signed something."

"I expect you signed in as a voluntary patient; then they're covered,
Evans said.  Course they don't want you to leave.  They won't get paid
if you leave I bet this costs a pretty penny."  Buzz looked around the
room.

"But I ain't scared of that great ox of a matron, even if she does
remind me of my old commandant.  and I ain't scared of Adam."  Elinor's
eyes filled with tears.

"Do you really think that Adam .. ."

"Adam brought you here in the first place, my lamb."

"Why did the girls allow it?  Elinor asked sadly.  She could vaguely
remember Annabel and Miranda's visit, but Clare hadn't come.  On the
plane to London, Adam had said that Clare still refused to see her; he
had hinted that she expected an apology.  What sad stupidity.  How
silly they had both been.  Of course she would apologize to Clare.

Buzz said, "The girls trust Adam, but he's getting too big for his
boots ordering everyone around.  Adam even says Saracen costs too much
to run.  He says them trustees are going to sell it and keep you here
because it'll be cheaper."

"Sell Saracen!  Never!  Why should Adam bother to do that?  He doesn't
benefit from the trust ... I "Adam's up to no good," Buzz said
firmly.

"But we won't worry about that now.  What's important is to get you out
of here.  And this is how we'll do it!"

Elinor listened carefully as Buzz leaned close to her ear and outlined
her plan.

"I'll go straight back to Eastbourne.  I'll buy two identical morrow
I'll turn-roats and hats in some bright colour.  To up here again at
ten and tell the taxi to wait.  I'll ask him to move along a bit, so he
ain't blocking the entrance.  I want him waiting by this corner.  Then
I come in with my suitcase, and Matron thinks I'm on my way to the
airport.  She's not to know I was supposed to catch yesterday's
plane."

"Thank God you didn't."

"In that suitcase, Nell, will be a coat and hat same as ne for you to
wear.  I get you dressed.  I open them glass doors to the garden.  You
walk out slowly, with your head turned away from the house, to my taxi.
You get in the taxi.  I wait for you to do that; then I simply walk
through the main hall, my empty suitcase in my hand.  Then we drive
hell for leather to the airport and catch the next plane to Nice."

"Buzz, darling Buzz, that's a brilliant escape plan."  Elinor's face
crumpled and she started to cry.

The door of the bedroom flew open to reveal the huge, forbidding
presence of the matron.  Firmly she said, "We don't want to over fire
Mrs.  O'Dare."  Buzz stood up.

"I was about to go.  I'll pop in tomorrow to say goodbye on my.  way to
the airport."  She wagged a finger at Elinor.

"Now be a good girl and do as you're told."  In the cab on the way back
to her Eastbourne hotel, Buzz checked her plan; she was determined to
look upon this as a lark, as she and Nell had regarded some of their
dangerous escapades in the Great War.  Buzz spent the cab ride
reminiscing about those times, some grim and some sad, but all of which
made her smile.

In the darkening afternoon, the taxi pulled up to her kotel.  She paid
the driver, and as she turned to enter, she felt a snap.  Buzz found
herself lying face up in the snow, in great pain, unable to move: as
helpless as a black beetle flipped on to its back.

Immediately Buzz knew she'd broken her hip.  It irritated her to think
that she hadn't been doing anything reckless like running to catch a
bus; but she had a private theory that an old person didn't break a hip
because she fell, but fell because her hip snapped, after gradual
erosion.

The taxi driver jumped from his cab and hurried to her side.

"Lucky thing I saw you in the rear mirror just as I was driving off!"

As he ran to the hotel for help, Buzz realized that Elinor's escape
would have to be postponed.  She must let Elinor know this.  She would
telephone Miranda.

The following day, Elinor again hid her medication under her tongue,
slipped it into her handkerchief, and later flushed it down the
lavatory.  With carefully suppressed excitement, she waited for Buzz to
arrive.

But Buzz did not come.  After a few days, having received no telephone
call, letter, or message of any kind from Buzz, Elinor started to lose
hope.  The medical staff had realized that she wasn't swallowing her
medication, and it was now dissolved before being administered.  In her
occasional lucid moments, Elinor again wondered if she was losing her
sanity.

CHAPTER 22

MONDAY, 4 MARCH 1968

4Mr.  Grant?  Tell him to come straight in."  As she replaced the
telephone, Miranda, prim in a high-necked grey flannel suit, checked
the Cartier travelling clock on her white desk She had to finish
reading the pile of reports in front of her and make the necessary
decisions before tomorrow's jaanagement meeting.

Adam sauntered in, his hands in the pockets of his dark city suit.  He
looked at Miranda's white, exhausted face and said, "I thought you
might like to knock off early and go to Hair'.

Hair, the psychedelic tribal-love-rock American musical that celebrated
hippie values, free love, hash, and hatred of IJhe Vietnam War, had
opened the day after stage censorship by the lord chamberlain had been
abolished.

"I'd love to, but Miranda pointed to the piles of papers.

"And I have to find time tomorrow to visit Buzz."  Buzz was still in an
Eastbourne hospital.

"Forget everything else, just for one evening.  We've got something to
celebrate.  In our first year as a public company, our pre-tax profits
have increased by twenty per cent."

"But KITS showed a loss of thirteen thousand pounds," Miranda reminded
Adam.

He shrugged his shoulders.

"That's understandable.  KITS paid the expenses of SUPPLY KITS during
its first year of trading including those huge consultants" fees and
all bank interest.  It's not really a loss if you look at the overall
company situation."

"It's not only the loss that's worrying me," Miranda said.

"KITS now has weak middle management and poor internal communication;
that's causing us big problems.  And we need better distribution, but
can't afford it."

"So long as you know what's wrong, you can fix it."

"Sure if I had the time."  Wearily Miranda put down her pen.

"I wish I could turn the clock back two years, when my time was spent
running KITS.  It depresses me to waste time being photographed and
hyped."

"Your real problem is that you've become very successful, very quickly,
Miranda.  Some people would like your problem."

"Every morning when I wake up, I ask myself, If I'm so damned
successful, why do I feel tired and miserable?"  "You just need a
couple of days off," Adam.  soothed.

"Why not fly to St-Moritz for a long, lazy weekend?  Get a little snow
and sunshine."  Hands in pockets, he moved into the horseshoe of her
desk.

Miranda swivelled her white leather chair around to face him.  She
laughed.

"That's unlike you, Adam.  What do you want?"  He leaned forward and
quickly unbuttoned the top of Miranda's prim suit.

"I want you," he said firmly, and slid his hand beneath the grey
flannel.

Adam had never touched her in the office, and she was not expecting it.
Miranda felt the immediate and powerful reaction of her body to this
forbidden sensuality.  Trembling, she reached backward for the
telephone.

"June?  No more calls please."  Her voice was slightly over
controlled

Adam pulled her from her chair, undid two more buttons, quickly
unzipped her skirt: Miranda was left standing in a daffodil-yellow
camisole and black high-heeled boots.  Adam gently slid the daffodil
straps from her shoulders.

Miranda gasped, "We always said ... never in the office..."

V2

"I don't remember."  Adam picked her up in his arms and Akid her on her
desk: reports slithered off it and the Cartier clock crashed to the
floor.

"We'll leave the boots on," Adam said.

"Adam, I simply can't risk it.  If June came in, this would be round
the entire company within seconds.  And I can't lock the door.  Let's
go back to my place and What Adam said then was the last thing that
Miranda expected.  He looked down at her flaming hair and beige, naked
body and whispered, "I love you."  That left Miranda speechless.  Adam
started to stroke her body.  He murmured, "I love your boobs, and I
love your ass.  And I love you because you're so exciting.  And I love
the way you love it."

"Only with you," Miranda whispered.

Adam reached to a shelf behind Miranda's desk and picked up a case of
cosmetic samples.  He flicked it open, picked a magenta lipstick, and
scrawled across her breasts, GREAT BOOBS.

Gently he turned her body over.  He picked up a pot of turquoise
eyeshadow, dipped his forefinger in it, and scrawled across her
buttocks, GREAT ASS.

Then he turned her once more, gently, and pried her thighs apart; in
violet eyebrow pencil, he drew an arrow UP each white thigh.  At the
head of each arrow, he scrawled further appreciation.

With a lipstick pencil, he drew bracelets of crimson hearts around her
wrists; with green eyeliner, he encircled her ankles with bracelets of
kisses.  He covered her body with colourful graffiti.

Adam then selected a very expensive make-up brush, intended to apply
blusher, and started carefully to brush Miranda's tuft in a circular
motion.

Later, on their way to the theatre, Miranda snuggled happily against
Adam in the back of the chauffeur-driven Mercedes.

"By the way," he said, as if he had almost forgotten to mention it.

"Remember you said you wanted a better distribution system for KIT ST
Miranda nodded.

"And you'd like to expand into other countries, where the KITS system
is already being copied?.

Miranda nodded again.

"It so happens that SUPPLY KITS also needs more cash.  It looks as if
we'll be able to buy the Stiebel-Stein mail-order business, so I've
been working on ways to raise the money.  As a matter of fact, that's
what I came into your office to discuss, you gorgeous man trap

"Explain," Miranda said sleepily, wondering if she'd be able to stay
awake until the end of the show.

"We'll have a rights issue."  Miranda sat up abruptly.  She knew that
if a company issued extra shares to raise more money, the value of the
existing shares was diluted.

"I don't like the idea of further diluting my shareholding," she said.
Adam ignored her objection.

"To raise sufficient capital, we'll probably need a one-for-three
issue."

"That'll mean issuing one extra share for every three existing shares.
You're telling me that instead of owning all of three oranges, I'll own
three quarters of four oranges."

"Exactly.  You'll still be worth exactly the same amount, but the
company will have more working capital."  In a worried voice, Miranda
asked, "Won't a rights issue make SUPPLY KITS more vulnerable to a take
overT "Theoretically, yes, but that's unlikely to happen so long as the
company is successful and the shareholders approve of the way it's
run."  Adam patted her knee.  Miranda instinctively pulled away from
him.

"You sl,ould remember that very few chief executives of public
companies own a controlling interest in them," Adam said patiently.

"There's no need for you to worry.  Your shareholders have complete
confidence in you.  And let's not forget, you're all-important to the
company in other ways: you're the chief shareholder and the public
image of the firm."  Miranda sighed.

"Adam, I do wish you wouldn't spring these things on me when I'm not
expecting them."

"I'm sorry, darling.  I thought you'd be as excited as I am by the
idea."  He should have stuck to his usual tactics.  When Adam had a
document for Miranda to sign that he thought she might argue about, he
always included it in a sheaf of other papers he handed to her at the
end of the day when she was exhausted.  He always said that these
docents needed immediate decisions.  While she exam med the papers, he
would distract her attention by asking questions about other matters.
If she queried anything, he blasted her with expertise.  Because she
trusted Adam, Miranda allowed herself to be convinced.

On the following afternoon, Miranda went to Eastbourne.  As always, she
was depressed by the sight of her grandmother: Elinor lay inert, neatly
tucked into her bed, white, frail, and exhausted.

And as always, although she clearly recognized Miranda, Elinor seemed
almost too tired to speak.

"How's Buzz?"  "She's fine, absolutely fine," Miranda said.  She hadn't
told her grand mi other about Buzz's accident; she did not want to
further distress Elinor.

"Then why doesn't she visit meT Elinor asked.

"She's ... back at Saracen," Miranda lied.

"I wish they'd let me have my telephone," Elinor whispered.

"No, darling, not while you're on medication," Miranda said sadly.

She then drove to Eastbourne General Hospital.  Buzz lay on a high,
black-barred hospital bed, in a pale green room as small as a shoe box.
Pale green pipes writhed around the top and bottom of the walls and in
a complicated pattern over the ceiling.

Buzz took off her radio earphones.

"You're a good girl, coming to visit your old Buzz.  I been looking
forward to this all day.  A pink azalea!  Wicked extravagance, you
naughty girl!"

"And I've brought this bed jacket from Annabel."

"Pink marabou!  I'll feel like a blooming film star!"

"Can't they give you a prettier room?"  Miranda asked as she contrasted
Elinor's luxury to this austere little cubicle, the best that
Eastbourne General could offer.

"Now don't you make a fuss, Miranda," Buzz admonished.  She added
carefully, "Have you visited your gran?  Why can't I phone her?"  "They
still want her to rest.  They took away the telephone after Gran tried
to telephone Buckingham Palace to complain to the Queen."

"They're pumping so much rubbish into her!  Half the time, Nell don't
know what she's doing!  You should take her away from that place, my
girl!  Get her to the London Clinic and see what another doctor says."
Miranda looked away.  If she mentioned paranoia, Buzz would insist that
Elinor was the victim of a lot of quacks.  Buzz's views on psychiatry
were well known: psychiatrists were 'trick-cyclists', not to be taken
seriously, people who said that grown men were in love with their
mothers: disgusting.

Gently Miranda said, "I'm sure Gran's in the best place, for the time
being.  We mustn't interfere with her treatment."

"Treatment!"  Buzz snorted.  She wondered why strongwilled Miranda was
going along with what Adam wanted.  Because she was, Buzz couldn't
confide in her.  So she

V6

touldn't rescue Elinor until she left Eastbourne General.

c couldn't even write to her, lest her letters be opened by that
two-faced ugly bitch of a matron.

In the thirties-style luxury of the Savoy Grill, Adam chose expensive
wines to accompany the meal Colchester oysters, foie gras, and
porterhouse steak chosen by his guest, Alistair Stacey-Cripps, a former
schoolfriend, now a stockbroker.

When the wine steward.  left Adam's guest continued, "At midday, the
share price was forty-six shillings, which makes the value of SUPPLY
KITS three million pounds."

Adam nodded.

"We're offering the new one-for-threes to existing shareholders at a
discount of eight per cent."

"You're sure that Miranda won't want to take up her rights is sueT
"Positive."  Recently the trust had refused Miranda's request for a new
plane and an extension to her house.  Thinking of that, Adam added, "In
fact, she'll be delighted to sell them."

"And you're sure that this Bermuda company controlled by you will lend
me the half-million pounds in cash to buy these shares, at no
interest?" "Absolutely certain.  Later, you'll sell them to me at
sixpence profit to yourself."

"After you've notified," Alistair reminded Adam.  Although not a legal
obligation, the director of a public company was supposed to notify the
chairman before he dealt in company shares.

"I must get this absolutely clear," he went on.

"Miranda currently holds sixty per cent of the shares, you hold fifteen
per cent, and twenty-five per cent are held by the public.  But if we
go ahead as planned, then Miranda will own forty-five per cent a
minority holding and after acquiring her shares, and taking up your
rights issue, you will own thirty per cent."

V7

Adam tasted the wine and nodded.  The waiter carefully poured the'45
Chiteau Margaux.

Alistair said, "And then you want me quickly to buy as many publicly
held shares as possible."

Adam nodded again.

"Funds will be made available as you require them."

"By this same Bermuda company?"  Alistair asked.

Adam nodded a third time.

"You realize, Adam, that I'm legally obliged to inform SUPPLY KITS of
my acquired shareholding?"

"If anyone asks at some later date, you can claim some oversight in
your office administration.  If you produce a copy letter from your
files, then it will look as if you did inform the company.  Letters are
often lost in the post."

"A wonderful claret," Alistair said.  He lifted his glass.

"Here's to your controlling interest."

TUESDAY, 7 MAY 1968

In the library of his apartment, Adam sipped a pure Highland malt
whisky as he waited.

Eventually Alistair telephoned.

"I've bought a further sixteen per cent of SUPPLY KITS  So you now
control forty-six per cent, which is one per cent more than Miranda
holds.  I couldn't buy more because the price is shooting up too much
buying.  Closing price was sixty shillings, which values the company at
five point one million pounds."

"Good.  How much did the shares cost?"  "One million four hundred and
sixty-one thousand one hundred and fifty pounds."

"Then you made a decent profit, Alistair," Adam reminded him.

Alistair couldn't resist asking, "Didn't Miranda smell a rat?"
"Alistair, Miranda is extremely happy: her shares have

V8

up in value and are now worth well over two million r ds.  In fact,
that afternoon, Miranda had been worried by the swift rise in share
price; she had asked Adam whether he thought anyone might be buying
with a view to a takeover bid.

Adam had laughed and told her not to be dramatic.  They could expect
takeover bids when the company was more firmly established, but not
when it was still learning to walk.

As Adam replaced the telephone, his guest was announced a small,
mild-looking, bald man who looked at least fifteen years older than his
actual age of thirty-five.

"Hello, Paul," Adam said.

"Have a good trip?"

"Not bad.  Weak whisky, please."  Paul Littlejohn settled kim self
carefully on the sofa.

"How is Mrs.  O'Dare?"  "I'm sorry to say she's still alive," Adam
said.

"But not for much longer.  I've made it clear to Craig-Dunlop that the
family doesn't want her life prolonged, for religious -reasons.  He got
the message: an enormous bonus when she dies, removal to some other
nursing home if she doesn't."

"Her death no longer matters.  I'm virtually in control of the trust
now.  You're legally responsible for nothing, Adam."  Littlejohn
shrugged his shoulders.

"And our actions can't be legally queried under Bermuda law, British
law, or any other law."

Adam smiled.

"What's the income situation?"  "All book royalties have been received;
two per cent has been deducted by my firm the agreed management fee.
The remainder was immediately sent on to the appropriate numbered Swiss
account."

"And the transfer of the capital how's that proceeding."  The capital
was the bulk of the fortune.  I "Ah, that has to be done more slowly,
and cautiously."  Paul Littlejohn sipped his whisky.

"The shares have all been sold and cash lodged in various banks,
according to your instructions.  However, I can't just ship it all in
one huge transfer to Switzerland.  If I did that, there would be nasty
questions from the Bermuda authorities when the sisters discover that
the money's gone."

"Leave the authorities to me."  Littlejohn lifted a hand of caution.

"As I'm going to be blamed, I must be cautious."

"You're being paid a bloody fortune for being blamed.  Is everything
else going according to planT Littlejohn nodded.

"The funds are currently being invested in our bogus companies; their
value will fall dramatically over the next six months."

"Good!"

"But I'm warning you, Adam, I'll have to leave something in the Dove
Trust a bit over fifteen per cent or I can't justify what I've done."

"I don't see why you can't empty the account."

"There's nothing wrong with choosing the wrong investments," said Paul
Littlejohn carefully.

"Nobody can see into the future, and all stock exchange investment is a
gamble.  But if we don't leave something in the till, it will be
spotted as a cheeky scam, and bribery or not, I won't get away with
it."

Adam thought briefly.

"If they're going to keep fifteen per cent, then I'm going to stop
showering money on those bitches in fact, I've already started to cut
back.  And I'll sell that bloody great chdteau as fast as possible."

"Don't be too greedy," Littlejohn cautioned.

"We can't afford an official inquiry during the next year.  It's the
only thing that worries me.  During that time, we just can't risk
having our moves queried.  You will have to keep the sisters quiet I
don't care how you do it."

"Leave them to me too," Adam said confidently.

"I'll keep them quiet.  You move the money into those Swiss accounts
the faster, the better."  Paul Littlejohn nodded.  Without being told,
he knew that as fast as the payments were made into five Swiss bank
accounts, the money was transferred into five different accounts the
numbers of which were known only to Adam.

THURSDAY, 23 MAY 1968

Adam sat at his usual lunchtime table in the Savoy Grin the one
discreetly opposite the main entrance, so that without seeming to do
so, he saw everyone who entered the restaurant.  Eating quail's eggs,
he frowned as he reread the letter from Lloyd's: it warned him of the
amount that he would shortly be expected to produce in settlement.

He looked up as the lean figure of his guest approached.  Then he
shoved the letter in his jacket pocket and stood.

"Good to see you, Scott."  Scott Svenson Wore blue jeans and jacket
over a navy Tshirt and a wide, striped kipper tie, which looked
ridiculous. The tie had been loaned by the headwaiter; unless male
guests wore a tie, they were not allowed in the Grill.

Scott sat down.

"Hi, Adam!"  He noticed that Adam's appearance was unchanged.  While
all around him, men wore their hair at shoulder length and sported gold
chain necklaces, frilled pink shirts, flared-leg hipster trousers, and
coloured boots with platform soles, Adam had remained carefully
traditional.  Scott would bet that he had never worn the snakeskin
overcoat Annabel had given him the Christmas before.

Spurning the menu, Scott said, "I'll eat whatever you're eating, Adam,
plus a glass of milk.  I've a heavy afternoon ahead, and I'm off to
Paris tomorrow by parachute if they can't get me in by any other
method.  I'm covering the riots."

"You lead a more exciting life than I, I'm glad to say."

"It isn't so easy."  Scott's network job was taking up more time and
concentration than he'd expected.

"Nothing ever is."

"I really wanted to see you on behalf of Annabel," Scott said.

"Has something come up?"  I saw her briefly only two weeks ago.  She
was on her way to visit Buzz."  Just before Buzz was due to leave the
hospital, the pin in her hip had worked loose, and a total hip
replacement had been necessary.

Scott's speckled green and gold eyes looked speculatively at Adam.  He
said, "Annabel doesn't understand why the trustees originally allowed
her large sums of money but are now refusing relatively small sums."

Adam sipped his wine.

"Initially the money on deposit was distributed between Annabel and
Miranda.  Having emptied the honey-pot, I understand that the trustees
are now allowing the income to build up again before further
distributions."  As steak-and-kidney pie was placed before them, Adam
added, "In addition, the trust has to pay Elinor's very heavy medical
expenses."  He sniffed the dish of peas.

"Good, cooked in fresh mint.  As you know, Scott, I don't control the
Dove Trust, but if Annabel needs extra funds, then I would be happy to
suggest further payments."

"Annabel would prefer a modest regular income to occasional lump sums,"
Scott said.

"And if you don't control the trust, Adam, then it's time we knew who
does.  We want to know everything about the Dove Trust and its
officers.  We want to understand the structure, the aims, the
obligations.  We want to know precisely what funds the trust handles,
where those funds are, and what regular income might be expected from
the capital sum."

Adam helped himself to peas.

"I thought Annabel already had that information although, of course,
there's no legal reason why she should.  The trust is run like any
other ness, with annual accounts prepared by qualified acuntants
although, again, that isn't legally necessary.  I understand the final
accounts for 1967 were signed last week.  I'll see that a copy is sent
to Annabel."

"Are accounts produced only once a ye arT "That's the usual procedure."
Adam decided to stall for time.  He didn't want this newsman poking his
nose into the trust.

"If you like, Scott, I could suggest quarterly accounts, although
that's an "pensive business."

"That's what I intended to ask you."

"Then I shall arrange it, "said Adam, who had no intention of producing
quarterly accounts for this inquisitive journalist.  He decided to
arrange that a large monthly income be paid to Annabel until next May:
that should shut her up.  Smular sums would also have to be paid to
Miranda, blast it, for very quickly she would learn of Annabel's new
income.  Still, lose a lure to catch a mackerel or, in this case, a
whale.  But Scott could stir up a lot of trouble before next May.
Something would have to be done about Scott.

That evening, having explained that the best place to enjoy a peach was
in the bath, Adam fed one slowly to Miranda.

The mirrored walls and ceiling of her large bathroom reflected the room
to infinity.  In spite of a complicated lighting system, only one
candle flickered in an antique silver candlestick.

In the warm water of the square, sunken marble tub, Adam lay beside
Miranda; he soaped her body as though she were a royal baby.  Dreamy
and passive, she lay in the scented water and gave in to Adam's sensual
massage.  They listened to the Beatles on Miranda's new stereo; the
magical mystery of "Strawberry Fields Forever" reminded her of her
grandmother, so lonely, isolated, and unreachable in the prison of her
own head.  Sharply Miranda diverted her thoughts: she did not want to
plunge again into pointless depression.

"Where did Scott take you to dinner?"  Adam asked.

"That new Italian place in the King's Road," Miranda murmured.

"Why is it that pansies seem to run the best restaurants?"

"The queers are all coming out of the closet after last year's
legislation," Adam said.  Homosexual acts between adult men were now
legal in Britain.

"What was the restaurant like?"  "The usual Italian thing.  Vaulted-
ceilings, everything white, one perfect flower spotlit in the centre of
each table, impeccable fettuccine primavera."

"Did Scott have anything interesting to say?"  "He was a bit too
earnest to be amusing."  Miranda gently splashed scented water at
Adam.

"As a matter of fact, Scott spent most of the first course warning me
against you.  He wants me to visit STG and find out more about the
trust."

"The trust no longer has anything to do with STG, Adam said, hiding his
annoyance as he soaped Miranda's soft right underarm.

"And you saw the trust accounts for last year, remember?"

Adam turned his attention to Miranda's other tender places and casually
added, "Perhaps you'd better give Annabel a call, to reassure her that
you're keeping a watchful eye on the accounts.  Explain again that
trustees are very careful with somebody else's money ... That reminds
me, did I tell you that the trustees have turned down a request from
Annabel?"

"No," Miranda said.

"What forT "She wanted a large sum of money to fund some project at the
Bronx Zoo.  Unfortunately, this request didn't come within the trust
beneficiary limits.  I expect that's what's behind Scott's concern."

"The trust was absolutely correct to say no," Miranda agreed.  Then she
added, carefully casual: "What I'd really Jike to talk to Annabel about
is us.  I'm sure everyone in Ac office guesses."

"Our relationship isn't your secret, it's our secret, and I want it
kept secret," Adam murmured, his voice smooth but determined.

"I've never understood why you want to keep it a secret - I wish I
did," Miranda said, returning to their perennial source of
disagreement.  A year ago and again at Christmas she had proposed,
playfully.  On both occasions, he had laughed the idea off as a
charming joke.

Miranda was puzzled and humiliated by Adam's rejection.  He had now
been her lover for nearly three years: the physical side of their
relationship seemed to be perfect.  Miranda, while not vain, did not
suffer from false modesty.  She knew that she was beautiful, although
her looks were not as sensational as Annabel's.  She was a perfect size
ten: at five nine, perhaps a little too tall, but Adam was well over
six feet.  Rich and famous, Miranda knew she was also an interesting
companion.

Besides, Adam said that he loved her.  At the back of her mind, Miranda
heard the ghostly voice of Buzz say, "Any Latin lover can say "I love
you"," but she pushed the thought away, just as she had pushed away
other silly possibilities.  Perhaps Adam sought a bride with better
status.  If so, Miranda thought sarcastically, Princess Anne would soon
be old enough for him.

The only other reason Miranda could think of for her failure to get
Adam to the altar was her success; she knew that while many women were
attracted to a man by his status, many men saw a successful
businesswoman as a direct competitor.  An insecure man, she knew, might
not want to be married to someone more powerful than himself.

But Adam was extremely successful in his own right.  So why wouldn't he
marry her?

Knowing that Adam always liked to keep his options open, Miranda was
forced to the lonely conclusion that he didn't love her enough to
commit himself to her for life.  As is always the case when a person
wants something and can't have it, her frustration merely increased her
desire.

As he soaped Miranda's back, Adam knew perfectly well that she was
about to propose to him again.  But if he tied himself to Miranda, he
would have less influence over Annabel, who would then have legitimate
reasons to doubt his objectivity.  However, Miranda, who couldn't stand
indecision, wasn't the sort of woman to be fobbed off for much longer.
Until he controlled all the money, Adam couldn't risk either sister
querying his moves: he needed to placate and control both of them.

So Adam intended, when Miranda asked him, to reassure her by promising
to marry her one day.  In fact, if she got too insistent, he might
agree to an engagement on ... say, February seventh, Miranda's
twenty-eighth birthday.  With any luck, the trust funds should be in
his hands shortly after that date, at which point he would say goodbye
to Britain for ever.

Adam's wet arm lazily reached for another peach.  He said, "I can tell
you're thinking about something."

"You know what I'm thinking about," Miranda replied sadly.

"Well, stop it, or I'll tie you to the bedposts with silk ribbons and
do wicked things to you, so you won't be able to think of anything
else."  He slid his hands beneath Miranda's soapy body.  As he caressed
the two pale curves of flesh that rose above the water, he decided what
to do about Scott.

TUESDAY, 22 AUGUST 1968

Adam drove his D B 4 Aston Martin rather too fast through the peaceful
country lanes of Sussex.  He was taking Annabel to see the latest
production of Figaro at the Glyndebourne Festival, both of them wearing
full evening dress.  Some people might consider it surreal, even
ludicrous, to set off for a country outing in mid-afternoon in full
evening dress, but this eccentricity is part of the Glyndebourne Opera
tradition, which began in 1934 when John Christie gave his opera singer
wife a wedding present her own little opera house, set in the sylvan
parks of a stately house in Sussex.  Now few musical occasions are more
beautiful, more typically British, more exquisitely performed, and more
elitist than an evening at Glyndeboume.

As usual, the seats were all occupied: part of what made the little
theatre so special was the fact that tickets were almost impossible to
obtain.  The London Philharmonic started the overture, and the audience
settled back to enjoy itself as the opening bars predicted the
light-hearted frivolity and charm of Mozart's enchanted
eighteenth-century world.

Adam, who was not musical, found it difficult to accept the elaborate
plot, with its disguises and unlikely mistaken identities, its
concealments in closets and too-coincidental overheard assignations, as
Figaro, the valet, fought his waster, the Count, for the favours of the
chambermaid Susanna.  But Adam had not come here for pleasure, he
reminded himself as the lights went up for the intermisSion During this
especially long interval, the audience either ate a three-course dinner
in the manor house or took chainpape picnics on to the lawns, enhanced
by the Sussex Downs in the background.

"Before the war, people used to bring their own butlers to serve their
picnics in those woods."  Adam pointed to the spot.

"Let's have our dinner there," he suggested as he helped Annabel
manoeuvre across a grassy ditch in her silver-bead cd grey chiffon
Jean Muir dress.  Black-faced sheep viewed their efforts with mild
surprise.

Adam carried the wickerwork picnic hamper over the grass to the trees;
they walked beside a chain of woodland pools which followed the course
of a stream and led to a small clearing carpeted by wild flowers.

"This might have been painted by Botticelli!"  Annabel kicked off her
shoes and sat down on Adam's rug.  Green leaves rustled slightly on the
soft breeze, and she heard the faint hum of a bee.

Adam took off his jacket, spread a white linen cloth on the grass by a
still, clear pool, then poured champagne into Annabel's glass, and
looked in the hamper.

"We have quail's eggs, chicken in curry-flavoured mayonnaise, cucumber
salad, and strawberries Romanoff."  In the twilight, they ate and
talked, Annabel looking like a wood sprite in her will-o'-the-wisp grey
chiffon.  Through the trees, in the distance, they could see the manor
against the sky, decked out in lights.  Annabel said, "What a
delightful way to end my British visit."

"I'm sorry it's been such a sad -trip for you."  Adam helped himself to
some quail's eggs.

Annabel had arrived in England two weeks earlier, intending to take
Buzz back to Saracen to complete her recovery.  But when Annabel
collected her, Buzz had asked to stay the night at a posh hotel in
Eastbourne.  Puzzled, Annabel agreed.

Shortly afterwards, when Buzz was supposedly resting, she had appeared,
wearing a bright mustard coat, at the Lord Willington Nursing Home,
where she asked to see Elinor.  As she insisted upon carrying a
suitcase into Elinor's bedroom, rather than leave it at the reception
desk, the receptionist feared that Buzz was perhaps smuggling alcohol
to an alcoholic patient; she immediately informed the matron.

Matron Braddock hurried to the bedroom, to find a vacant-looking Elinor
being helped by Buzz into an identical mustard coat.

When the furious matron asked Buzz to leave, she refused.  The matron
called two male nurses, who firmly escorted Buzz to her waiting taxi.
Matron Braddock later telephoned Adam, and he readily agreed that Buzz
should be banned The following day, Buzz tried to enter the nursing
home by the side gate but was spotted by a gardener.  The matron had
threatened to call the police if she tried again.

"What was sad," Annabel said, "was seeing poor Buzz refuse to believe
that Gran was ... how she is.  Poor darling, she really isn't with us
any more, but Buzz won't accept that, as we all must.  She seems to
think we're part of some conspiracy to imprison Elinor.  She's refused
to stay with Miranda, and she's very cross with me."

"It must be hard for Buzz to accept the fact that she's also ...
deteriorating," Adam said sympathetically.

"She's taken a room in a boarding-house in Earls Court, full of noisy
Australian students.  She says that once Gran used to live in the next
square."

"I don't want you or Miranda to worry about Buzz," Adam said firmly as
he refilled Annabel's glass.

"You've helped Buzz as much as she wants to be helped."  He smiled at
Annabel's worried face.

"I'll make a few quiet investigations.  The trust will pay her rent, as
well as her pension, and also any special medical care she might need.
I expect she'll soon calm down and see reason."  He poured more
champagne for himself.

"Oh, by the way there's something I want to discuss before you leave.
Scott says that you want the trustees to provide quarterly accounts,
and they're a bit mystified as to why because, as you know, Miranda
keeps a close eye on the accounts.  The trustees wondered if there was
any particular item that you wanted to query in the 1967 accounts."

Somewhat confused and not wishing to seem impolite, Annabel said, "Oh
no ... nothing particular."  She laughed apologetically.

"I know Miranda has the business brains off the family.  It just seemed
odd that when I asked for a relatively small sum .. ."  Her voice
trailed away as she carefully examined her forkfal of chicken.

"My dear Annabel, the job of the trustees is to protect the capital,"
Adam said gravely.

"They can7t whittle away the capital without risking serious legal
charges.  They are legally obliged to act for the benefit of the
beneficiaries, whether or not you all agree to their actions: that is
the whole point of a trust."  He refilled her glass again and said
reassuringly, "When enough income has accumulated, then, in addition to
your present allowance, you'll probably get the same large lump sum
that you had last year especially if Saracen is sold."

"Miranda told me the trust might sell Saracen.  We both hate to think
of it!"

"Now that de Gaulle's had his landslide victory with the Communist
seats halved it seems a prudent time to sell.  Sadly, Elinor may never
leave -the nursing home.  Should she do so, she could no longer manage
to run the chiteau, and neither, I suspect, can poor old Buzz."

Annabel put down her glass and looked about to cry.  Adam leaned over
and patted her hand.

"You must let the trustees make these worrying decisions.  That's why
'he your grandmother set up the trust in the first place.  S wanted you
to have no worries."  "She's always been so caring."  "Of course." 
Adam patted her hand again.

"If you'd like to go over all the legal paperwork with me again in
detail - I'd be happy to do it.  Can you spare, say, three hours at my
office tomorrow?"  Suspecting that she might be even more confused
after three hours of perusing legal documents, Annabel hastily said,
"It isn't really necessary.  Scott's a little overprotective.  I'm sure
Miranda's capable of checking these things."

"Miranda's special gift is for business."  Adam nodded.

4your gifts are quite different, Annabel, and ... very rare."

"I'd like to think I've got something going for me.  I'd like to think
I was good for something other than smiling to camera."

"Of course you are, Annabel.  I've just told you so."

"Now," Annabel said sadly, "when people say nice things about me, I
can't believe them.  When you're a model, the praise and flattery is
endless and addictive.  But as soon as your bookings start to slide,
the flatterers just ... melt away.  That's when you know you're a
has-been."

"What a sad little speech," Adam said gently.  Annabel's beautiful face
was not only her strength but also her weakness.  She was afraid of
getting ugly, fat, old.  Her dreaded thirtieth birthday came nearer
every day.

"I think your looks have improved since you stopped rnodelfing," he
continued.

"Since your face filled out, it's lost that worried, anxious look.  You
now have a delicious, serene quality."

"Do I realV."

"Yes, really, "Adam said, looking into Annabel's astonishingly
beautiful eyes.

"You're really an old-fashioned girl, Annabel, with charming,
traditional feminine qualities.  You're so much softer and more gentle
than ... your sisters."

"Oh!Do you really think soT "Miranda's obviously the new sort of woman
who's trying to take a man's place in a man's world, but when things
get tough, she still dodges final responsibility and turns to a man
me," Adam explained.

"Clare's another type of new woman: she also tries to take on a man's
responsibility, but she won't do things in the traditional way.  So she
makes a mess of it, can't manage on her own and can't understand why
and when she's bewildered she becomes aggressive."

"She certainly does," Annabel said with feeling.

"She was unspeakably rude when I telephoned."

"Your generation of women wasn't brought up to handle ultimate
responsibility."  To Annabel, at that moment Adam looked ready to
shoulder the world.

"Traditionally, men have always done that, and they know how tough it
is."  He smiled gently.

"But you, Annabel, don't need or want to prove anything.  You're happy
to be looked after and to enjoy life!  You're the only O'Dare sister
who's a realist."  Even as he spoke, Adam couldn't believe that Annabel
was swallowing this rubbish.  But she was still an underdeveloped
child, easily led, dependent, and naIve.  No wonder she had no
children.  Annabel was still a child herself.  She wanted to be taken
care of.  She didn't want to grow up and grapple with responsibilities
and problems.

Smiling, Adam offered the silver pudding dish, but Annabel shook her
head.

"I have to be careful."

"What rubbish!"  Adam laughed, looking Annabel's figure over
appreciatively.

"I agree that you no longer look like a starved greyhound, but you must
know that you are a sensuous and beautiful woman."

Annabel's basic amiability and good nature made her instinctively a
flatterer: she always wanted to make people feel happy.  Because of
this, she did not recognize flattery when it was used as a weapon
against her, to breach her de fences and melt her resistance.

Adam saw that, as with most women, praise would turn Annabel's head;
careful flattery would counteract her insecurity, for which she would
unknowingly feel grateful and the rest would be easy.

He leaned towards her and stroked her pale, chiffon shoulder.

"You look like a charming wood nymph in that gauze thing."  Through the
flimsy material, Annabel felt the heat of Adam's palm against her skin.
He was close enough for her to feel his warm breath and smell.  his
erotic odour.  She shifted slightly away from him.

Adam said, "Your beautiful mouth has a crumb on it."  He leaned closer.
Before Annabel realized his intention, he licked the side of her mouth
with a fast, serpentine flick of -his tongue.

His movement took her completely by surprise and so did her own bodily
reaction when he pressed his mouth on hers.  Annabel felt his hands
against her breasts.  She felt a melting warmth spread quickly through
her body.

After what they both recognized as token resistance, she slowly fell
back upon the grass, feeling that happy warmth down to the tingling
tips of her fingers.

Annabel was bewitched by Adam, overwhelmed by the feel of his body
crushing hers.  Unable to move, she felt the satin-slippery texture of
his lips and his slow, hungry kisses.

As Adam tore the grey chiffon from her breasts, Annabel felt her reason
drift away, replaced by a passionate longing for the continued hard
strength of his body.  She wanted him not only to cover her but to
envelop her; she wanted to efface herself and melt into him, lose
herself in the acstasy of fusion.  Adam lowered his now -naked body
upon hers and Annabel at last felt his flesh upon her flesh, hard and
warm.  She smelled the sharp scent of crushed wild thyme beneath her
head as he started to move slowly, steadily, and rhythmically.

Afterwards, they bathed, silent and naked, in the pool, and then still
naked they walked, barefoot and hand in hand, through the woods.  Often
they stopped to kiss and touch, regardless of who might see them, and
neither said a word.

Paylight had faded into dusk when they returned to their picnic site.
The overturned dish of chicken and the untouched strawberries were now
abuzz with wasps.

Annabel never saw the end of Figaro,

CHAPTER 23

SATURDAY, 7 SEPTEMBER 1968

Clare stood at the front door, feeling the sun warm her brown arms. The
cream climbing rose appropriately named New Dawn which she had planted
by the door was in full bloom.  A sweet-brier hedge enclosed the
garden, and before it grew fragrant, white tobacco flowers, delicate
sprays of gypsophila, and very pale pink hydrangeas.

She looked down the herringbone-patterned brick garden path that her
visitors were about to tread; the path was edged by herbs: behind the
mint were rosemary, thyme, and tarragon sadly, not doing very well.
Then came rows of vegetables, as satisfyingly neat as a sampler, in
lines of different-coloured greens: cabbages and cauliflowers,
lettuces, onions, and carrot tops.

Summer had spilled over into early September.  It was so golden a day
that Clare had almost decided to hold David's birthday luncheon in the
garden, but the buffet meal looked very pretty in the kitchen a bit
like a harvest festival; she had decorated the pink-walled room with
branches of elderberry and hawthorn, red berries, and sprays of
blackberricd brambles.  Flat loaves shaped like stooks of wheat had
been painted with egg yolk before Clare baked them, so that now they
shone; her showpieces were the open tarts: apricot and chestnut, plum
and raspberry, peach and pear, and shiny black cherry.

Clare decided to serve drinks before lunch her homemade lemonade and
elder flower wine under the apple trees.  Behind her, she heard David
clumping down the uncarpeted wooden staircase and turned to face him.
He looked so handsome in the cream silk shirt that was Clare's birthday
gift.

In a low voice, he said, "I'm sorry.  I'm leaving.  Now."

"You can't leave!  The guests are due, and they're nearly all your
friends!"

"They know me.  They'll understand.  I'm sorry.  I'm off."  When David
was in one of his moods, he would withdraw and treat Clare almost as if
she were a stranger.  He was always very polite but distant.

These moods differed from David's habitual absentmindedness, which made
him unreliable and unpredictable: sometimes he was so absorbed by what
he was doing that he lost track of time and forgot to eat or to go to
bed only looking up from his work or his book as dawn filtered through
the windows, when he would suddenly realize that he was ravenously
hungry and had forgotten to phone Clare.

But when David was in a depression, he would be unable to sit still.
Impatient and moody, he would stride restlessly around the kitchen or
open the front door.  Clare would run to a window and see his long legs
hurrying down the brick path to the garden gate, which he sometimes
vaulted in his haste to get away from her, she thought bitterly.  If
she tried to stop him from leaving, he became irritable.  And if he
agreed to stay, he would sit, immobile, in front of the fire for hours,
in blank resignation.  At some point, he would get up abruptly and
leave without a word.

When he was like this, it was impossible to persuade David to do
something, for no effort seemed worthwhile to him- he was incapable of
reading, of listening to the music lie loved, even of eating.  He
wanted only to be left alone.

At such times, Clare's self-esteem would start to crumble.  Her-
still-fragile newfound self-confidence had been built Up by her growing
pleasure in her successful bakery but Iso by David's loving
encouragement.

Clare had never probed for further explanation of his moods, but now,
as she stood waiting for David's birthday guests, she cried, "This time
you must tell me!  What do I do wrong?"

"I've told you before, it's nothing to do with you, Clare.  Please let
me go.  I can't explain at the moment."  Behind them, Josh, in a new
pair of jeans, clattered downstairs.  He looked from Clare to David and
said sharply, "WhatzoopT "Nothing, Josh," Clare said.

"We're just talking."  Josh ran off to, climb his favourite apple tree.
David fled down the garden path.

Clare's friends were surprised and sorry to hear that David had
suddenly developed a migraine.

David's friends some of whom Clare had never met before made no
comment, but exchanged swift understanding glances and enthusiastically
praised Clare's homemade wine.

he following evening, after Clare had put Josh to bed, she heard the
front door bang and knew that it was David.

She stayed in the kitchen, her elbows on the pine table and her chin in
her hands.

"David, I'd give anything to understand your black moods and be able to
help."

"I'm sorry.  I can't see anyone when I feel like that.  I can't work, I
can't talk to people.  I don't even turn up for business
appointments."

"Why?  "What's wrong with you?"  Clare asked.  Again she felt the
bewilderment she had experienced when she first saw her light-hearted,
friendly lover so intuitive and gentle, so naturally in touch with his
feelings change to a morose lump, a heavy, difficult weight that Clare
sometimes felt she bore upon her shoulders.  Sometimes David's fits of
depression lasted several days, and on the rare occasions when he
stayed with her, Clare felt mentally drained and physically exhausted
once he'd left.

in.  "I've told you before.  I get depressions.  I feel hemmed "But
surely that's when you need a loving friend to cheer you up?  To pour
you a drink, put on a record, and cook your favourite me aI?"  "That
sort of loving concern only makes me feel worse.  If I see that you're
making an effort to cheer me up, it sends me sliding down into the
black pit even faster because then I also feel guilty."  Clare said,
"Have you thought of seeing a doctor about "Our family doctor said that
I simply needed to snap out of my self-absorption and self-pity.  But
when I'm depressed" David shrugged his shoulders in a helpless gesture
'all people, all interests, and all activities tend to shrink and
dwindle until they ... disappear.  I can't think or talk or concentrate
or move, sometimes and I feel as if I'm in a black vacuum.  It takes an
enormous effort to say "Yes" or "No" to anyone.  I feel useless,
unwanted, and frightened.  I expect it sounds melodramatic, but I feel
trapped and without hope.  When that happens, it feels as if I've been
in that state nearly all my life, and that this, time I won't come out
of it."

"But surely something must help you when you feel like thatr "I'he only
thing that helps is time.  I just want to be alone, with no one making
any demands on me, however slight, while I pray that it will pass.  You
must understand that you can't help me.  Nobody can.  I only bring
other people down with me.  I've learned that it's best if I just
disappear and sit it out."

"Do the people in your office know?"  Clare asked as she struggled to
understand what seemed to her a change in character as abrupt,
unlikely, and terrifying as that of Dr.  U into Mr.  Hyde.

"It's always posed a problem at work.  Last time I was fired, I asked
my uncle for help."  David's uncle had realized that persistence,
tenacity, and the medical profession seemed useless in helping David,
and so he had helped him to establish a small private country practice,
where the pressure was not so great as in London and David could work
at his own pace.

"My colleagues are understanding and tactfully ignore my symptoms," he
went on.

"It's the best thing to do."

"Then I will, if that's really what you want," Clare said.

After that talk, she realized that she mustn't try to get too close to
David.  She sensed that if she wanted him to stay with her, she had to
let him feel free to leave.  She must learn to trust his love for her
and not to question his absences or his sudden departures.

In return, because he was neither possessive nor jealous, David was
careful to give Clare the same freedom and privacy she gave him, not
realizing that it was the last thing she wanted.

SATURDAY, 21 SEPTEMBER 1968

In David's bedroom, Clare knelt on the window seat, from which she
could look down upon a spectacular bird's-eye view of Bath.  Below her,
the city of golden stone spread like a beautiful, fragile toy replica
of classical Greek temples, set in squares and crescents of greenery.

David's house which he was buying on a mortgage perched on the rim of
the green basin in which Bath nestled, It was bare yet calm and
wonderfully comfortable: it was a house in which you could curl up for
the winter and almost regret the coming of summer.  It was a home.

Beneath David's bedroom, the sitting room contained great quantities of
books, piled on the floor as well as stacked on the shelves; these
piles overflowed through the door and on to the staircase.

"Underneath the sitting room was a large topaz-painted kitchen with a
splendid view at either end.  Since the terraced house was built on the
side of a hill, one entered from the street directly into the kitchen. 
The walls were covered with pictures: architectural prints hung next to
children's paintings; antique views of Bath were beside snapshots of
friends; postcards were taped to the walls, as were posters by Matisse
and Hockney.

David's offices were on the two lower floors.  Beyond the tree-shaded
narrow garden, black-and-white Friesian cows grazed in a field.  When
he was depressed, David often sat at the end of the garden; hunched up,
he would stare for hours at the cows.

Hearing David clatter up the stairs, Clare -crossed her fingers and
hoped he would stay in a good mood for this afternoon's concert at the
Assembly Rooms.

David burst into the bedroom.

"Time we left," he said.

"You'd better wear a sweater.  These late-September days can suddenly
turn cold."  He opened a drawer, pulled out a green sweater, and threw
it to her.

"I think that Bath is the loveliest city in the world," Clare said
dreamily as she shut the window.

"Small thanks to the city fathers.  When John Wood drew up his scheme
for rebuilding the city, the Bath Corporation didn't like it, so poor
Mr.  Wood was forced to build it bit by bit, starting with Queen
Square."  David was one of the architects involved in the rebuilding
and cleaning of the city, which was slow work: a lot of the old stone
was still stained black with the soot from Victorian chimneys and the
early railway; there were still bomb sites from the German air raids in
1942.  David asserted that even more damage had been done after the
war, by the short-sighted ity planners who demolished the Georgian and
Victorian workmen's cottages and replaced them with ugly apartment
blocks.

cy walked downhill past a classic semicircle of small " elegant houses
with pillared entrances.  Clare paused on e stone pavement to peer into
a bow-fronted shop.  Inside were charming children's clothes.

David gently pulled at her hand.

"Come on!  You know Josh would hate those rich-kid clothes."

"I wish we'd brought him with us."

"Stop feeling guilty about leaving him for once.  He's much better off
at the cottage making gingerbread men with Betsy."  Betsy, Clare's
assistant baker, was staying overnight.

11 can't help feeling guilty about depriving Josh of a lot of things,
especially as Christmas approaches."

"I'm going to take you both skiing," David reminded her.

"True.  You're wonderful with Josh.  But I now realize that no one
however wonderful can replace a child's own father."

"Divorce is one of the facts of life for modern children."  Clare
laughed angrily.

"I wish I could get a divorce."  Sam would not admit his adultery and
refused to divorce Clare for desertion, which he was now able to do
because three years had passed since Clare left him.  Unless Sam
changed his mind, under British law Clare would remain married to him
for ever: because she had deserted him, she was the guilty party.

David said, "I don't understand why you can't."

"No grounds.  If you rule out adultery, there's only cruelty difficult
to prove in British courts or unsound mind.  Sam hasn't been
continuously in a loony bin for five years, and he hasn't committed
rape, sodomy, or bestiality, so no divorce!"

"Who cares whether you're married or not?"  David shrugged his
shoulders.

"You'd do better to ignore this legal game.  Josh is happy enough.
You're making enough money from the bakery.  You're developing your own
ideas and independence."  "Encouraged by you."  Clare threw him a
grateful smile.

David had always helped her sometimes by kicking her to think for
herself as she built up her bakery business.  He had comforted her when
she became enmeshed in bureaucratic regulations.  He always said that
success was built on fOure, as any tycoon could tell her.

"I wish I didn't need your support so much," Clare said.

"I wish I could sta lad on my own feet."  I "You're learning fast.  And
I need your support, perhaps more than you realize."  Although he
laughed, David was serious.  He needed Clare's tenacity and stability
to balance his up-in-the-air exultation and down-in-the-dumps gloom.

"My passive side likes your passionate, determined, stubborn side," he
added.

"I like a clear, sharp-witted woman."

"But when I was married to Sam," Clare said, "I ended up a meek
doormat.  That was why he was so surprised when I got up and walked
away."

"That showed your guts," David said.

SUNDAY, 22 SEPTEMBER 1968

Standing next to Annabel at the Nice airport carousel, a drab young
woman was identifying luggage to the porter.  Vhile she waited for her
suitcases, Annabel glanced at the 'neighbouring pile.  Twelve navy
leather suitcases with maroon bindings had the initials S.K. stamped on
them in gold.  There were also three Louis Vuittons, one black leather
hatbox, a green tapestry carpetbag, eighteen cheap, suitcases in
different colours, one green plastic rubbish bin, one enormous
cardboard box held together by string, one child's folding stroller,
and two brown trunks trunks on a commercial flight!  Each item bore the
name Xhashoggi daubed in pink nail varnish..  Annabel was grateful for
this momentary distraction km her passionate longing for Adam.  She
felt a wrenching of her gut, a tightening, lurching feeling at the
thought of seeing him, or she dared not think about it of not seeing
him.

For the first time, it occurred to her that Adam might not meet her
flight, which was very late.  She caught her breath and crossed her
fingers.  Of course Adam would meet her!  Although, naturally, they
were both cautious: if somebody spotted them together, their secret
would slip into the gossip columns.

Annabel no longer cared about Scott's feelings, but Adam had made it
clear that, were it publicly known he had seduced the wife of a client,
his professional reputation would suffer.  Adam had also made it clear
that if that happened, he would immediately leave Annabel; for the only
thing worse than seducing a client's wife was marrying her.

A bitterly disappointed Annabel had protested that Scott wasn't Adam's
client, but Adam said that this was how it would be perceived.  Should
Scott sue him for alienation of affections, Adam might as well say
goodbye to his business, which was based on a client's trust of his
lawyer.

Annabel again felt relieved that she hadn't blurted out her secret to
Scott the previous evening, when he appeared with a martini jug in her
dressing room.

She had been astonished when Scott poured himself a second martini and
then, surprisingly, grumbled about Annabel's departure.  I've had a
tough time at work this week," he said reluctantly, "and I'd like to
talk to you about it on the weekend.  I need a little reassurance and
sympathy."

"Are you complaining" Annabel asked .

"You've no time for me these days.  Your brilliant career is all that
matters."

"Not to you," Scott said.

"I feel you don't give a damn about me now.  Of course you must visit
Elinor, but on the rare occasions when you're actually in this
apartment, you always seem too busy with your friends to have any time
fior me."

Annabel, flustered, snapped, "I'm not responsible for Gran's
illness!"

"But your trip tomorrow isn't to visit Elinor," Scott pointed out.

"Why can't Miranda spare the time to superintend this furniture sale at
the chfiteau?  Why should you be dragged from another continent to do
it?  I've half a mind to telephone her..  ."

Annabel hurriedly explained that Miranda was holding a seminar arranged
long before Elinor's illness.

When Scott was not mollified, Annabel looked at him from under her
eyelashes, pouted charmingly, and said, "Angel will be back in no
time."  Scott glared at her.

"Cut out that childish, cute behaviour it doesn't work with me any
more.  And while we're on the subject, you can also quit crying.  Your
tears don't make me feel strong and protective; they make me
exasperated 'annoyed, and resentful."  He finished his drink in one
gulp.

"I'm tired of having a child bride.  You no longer seem interested in
having a thoughtful conversation, producing a decent meal, or accepting
any responsibility.  If I say anything that sounds critical, you start
crying, as if I'm the world's biggest brute.  You are twenty-eight
years old, Annabel, and I now feel the need to be taken care of, looked
after, and loved for a change."

"Don't blame me for your career problems," Annabel had sobbed.

Her reverie was interrupted by the arrival of her suitcases.

Although he knew that Annabel expected to be met, Adam did not go to
Nice airport.  Instead, after switching on the water and heating in the
now deserted chAteau, he went for a newly fashionable jog in the
countryside around Saracen.

Intent on counting his paces and checking his rhythm and breathing,
Adam did not notice how the light altered in September so that the far
mountains were the same soft mauve as the lavender fields.  As he
panted along, he did not see the wild figs hanging above hedgerows
thick with ripe blackberries.  As he checked his pulse rate, Adam
failed to smell the delicate scent of conifers and coconut-scented
gorse and the acrid, sour, mysterious odour of the ditch.  He might as
well have been running around a cinder track or pounding lengths in a
gym.

Feeling pleasantly exhilarated by his exercise, Adam showered in
Elinor's bathroom something that he'd always wanted to do.  He liked to
feel really, really, really rich.

He whistled as he towelled himself, then sprinkled half a bottle of
invigorating cologne over his body.  Through the open window, he saw
the sky darken to grey, then slate purple.  He had timed his jog
nicely.

After an ominous moment of near silence, when only the soft rustling of
the ivy on the terrace could be heard, lightning split the sky with
sharp brilliance, followed by a mighty crash of thunder.

As rain slashed the chiteau, Adam closed the window.  He felt snug and
safe as he tightened his dressing-gown cord.  He decided to get some
champagne.

Without flowers, noise, or movement, the empty building seemed
lifeless.  As Adam walked through the entrance hall, his feet echoed on
marble from which the antique rugs had been removed for auction.  At
the end of this week, the furniture would also be taken to Sotheby's.
The appraiser was upstairs now, estimating the auction reserve
prices.

The drinks cupboard in the beige marble bar was empty, as was the
refrigerator, which had been turned off.  Adam walked to the kitchen,
which still smelled faintly of stale bread; he opened the door to the
slate-shelved larder, wrmally a treasure-house, with gargantuan
sausages and smoked hams hung from hooks in the ceiling too high for
mer, but the shelves were
tahleincgaetrtiogrepaecahc.hTyhoedreouwrasofstsiuUma faint smell of
bacon, and empty.

Adam slammed the door and opened the one beyond it, which led to the
old dungeon where Elinor kept her wine.  In the bulb-lit cellar, the
wine racks stood empty.

Eventually Adam found a forgotten bottle of brandy in the television
room.  As he sipped his drink, he heard a scratching on the glass doors
to the terrace.  Outside the French windows, a sodden ginger cat was
asking to be let in.  Supposedly, Fudge had been adopted by Sylvie the
cook, who reckoned that otherwise he wouldn't last long "among the
village toughs of the stray cat pack.

Happy to be home, Fudge curled up on the sofa beside Adam, who flipped
through an old magazine, irritated that v Annabel was late.  How
prudent it had been of him not to help It would do Annabel good to feel
a little dejected, little cast down, a little forlorn.  Adam smiled. He
supplied Annabel with reassurance.  but in order for it to work its
magic, she first had to feel "R'n RF Unsure of herself.

He could just remember Annabel's childish flirtations KIA" her
grandfather, but how she lapsed into terrified 4,1 if Billy slightly
raised his voice.  That was the A -Vay to handle her.

Adam liked to get tough with Annabel.  When she sensed Vl"" Us
disapproval, her lips would tremble with apprehension.

Oespotic benevolence in his voice, he would then reassure "You're so
special, Annabel', knowing he could get her to do almost anything for
him, if she thought he really that.  -'"with her he was truly-applying
the lessons he had learned from reading Elinor's novels. For Adam knew
that Annabel's head was filled with girlish hopes of romance; he know
that she was besotted by him, hungry for him.  He guessed that her LIFE
now revolved around their clandestine relationship: secretly
telephoning him or writing to him, their secret meetings.  Adam was
almost certain that Annabel longed to marry him if only he would ask
her.

Adam felt a carefully hidden contempt for the emotional dependence of
such women, who needed his approval.  Miranda was one of the few women
he had met who didn't want to experience life parasitic ally through
some man.

His present situation two sisters eating out of the palm of his hand
and the other one no longer in the running although somewhat taxing,
was only for five more months: Paul Littlejohn needed a little more
time than he had originally planned, but by the end of February, Adam
would be in Rio.

Had the sisters not fallen so easily into his hands, he suspected he
would have had a far harder job persuading them that Saracen should be
sold though if they had not agreed to the sale, it could easily have
been proved that selling was to their advantage: when- the cash from
the sale of the chiteau and its contents was invested, the resultant
income would increase the trust substantially.

But the sale of Saracen was a clear indication that Elinor would never
leave the nursing home, and had the sisters not both been emotionally
involved with Adam, the decision to sell it might once again have
raised the question of whether the nursing home was the best place for
her.

Adam had pointed out to Miranda that it was no longer in their power to
remove Elinor.  If such a patient wished to be discharged or should the
relatives wish it against medical advice, the Mental Hospital Act
provided for compulsory detention of up to twenty-eight days.  That
would undoubtedly attract the unpleasant attention of the press and
gain nothing.  A nursing home was not always the best choice for
everyone, but in Elinor's case it provided the 111He st care possible.
Reluctantly Miranda had agreed that Elinor was being well cared for in
luxurious surroundings.

As suddenly as it had started, the rain stopped, and weak sunshine
lightened the chdteau terrace.  In the television room, Adam's thoughts
were cut short by footsteps.  He looked up at the approach of "Mr. 
Simpson, the furniture j1ppraiser who had been sent from London.

"Excuse me, sir," Mr.  Simpson said.

"I've found something in Mrs.  O'Dare's private library that isn't on
the inventory.  It's a strongbox too large and heavy for me to
carry."

Adam followed the thin, black-suited figure upstairs and through
Elinor's bedroom, where the bed had been stripped and all the furniture
labelled.

In the library beyond the bedroom, the bookshelves contained old
children's books, tattered paperbacks, and six thousand reference
books.  On the cheap wooden table before the window stood a battered
black tin strongbox.

"It's locked, sir," Mr.  Simpson said, "but none of the housekeeper's
keys fit."  1. VI' lien please break it open," Adam told him.

"I should imagine there's a crowbar in the toolbox.  Look in the
kitchen."  Mr.  Simpson hesitated, then firmly said, "I would prefer
'not to do that, sir, without the written permission of the owner.

Adam, somewhat irritated, went downstairs to call the caretaker, who
would have no such scruples.

Ten minutes later, the black lid of the box creaked open.  Adam
dismissed the caretaker and Mr.  Simpson.  As soon as the door closed
behind them, he bent eagerly -Over the box.  But to his exasperation,
it appeared to contain only old photographs and childish memorabilia.

Adam rifled through children's paintings and letters; he threw aside
faded snapshots, with torn or curling edges, of smiling children in
sun-bonnets waving spades upon a beach or seated on the backs of fat
ponies.  At the bottom of the box were bundles of letters in envelopes
with an Oxford postmark; they were tied with narrow ivory satin
ribbon.

Severely disappointed, Adam was about to bang the lid down and leave
the room, when he had a second thought.  If Elinor had locked that box
and kept the key apart from the normal household keys, then there must
be a reason for it.  He had better carefully check the contents, item
by item.

Swiftly but carefully he sorted out the contents of the box on the
wooden tabletop.  After about ten minutes, he pounced on an ordinary
foolscap envelope, which was sealed.  Adam tore it open and pulled out
two crumpled sheets of paper.

As he read them, a triumphant smile spread across his face.

CHAPTER 24

TPESDAY, 31 DECEMBER 1968

Mranda's New Year's Eve ball was, as usual, a great Success.  Just
before midnight, she looked around the scarlet-and-blue-striped tent
with satisfaction.  Her vision was limited because her face was covered
by a golden lion's mask that looked as if it might have been dug from
an Inca burial ground; she wore a golden leotard and matching
high-heeled sandals; her hair, including a luxurious fall, spread
around her head like a flaming lion's mane.

This year's fancy-dress theme was a Fellini circus, and the tent
covered Miranda's back garden; inside it, the lighting was low and
mysterious; at foot level, swirls of theatrical mist were being pumped
upward.  Grouped around a revolving central circus ring were two
smaller circular tents and three raised platforms, each the size of a
small sitting room.  The two smaller tents were striped in pale blue
and silver; rising from the romantic mist, they looked as if they had
last been used at Agincourt.  One contained a gypsy fortune-teller, the
other a champagne bar.

A band played on the raised black platform, where three beautiful
singers, wearing what looked like silver underwear and Carmen Miranda
turbans, gasped the latest Dusty Springfield number.  Two other
pale-grey-carpeted platforms had been scattered with Louis XVI-style
chairs upholstered in pale grey moire: here guests sat to watch those
dancing in the revolving centre ring.

Strongmen carrying papier-mach6 dumbbells danced with tightrope-walking
ballerinas in pastel tutus; skimpily dressed bearded ladies, giants,
and dwarfs jounced and bounced, shook, bumped, and twisted.  A
fairground barker danced with a monkey-trainer, whose real monkey
mournfully sat on her elegant red satin shoulder.  An elephant did the
twist with a lion-tamer.  A tiger gyrated with a Nubian slave, naked to
the waist in harem trousers and a jewelled turban.  The bareback rider
in pink had turned up on a grey horse, which had then been led away by
her groom.

The women with the best figures wore leotards, tights, and high heels:
an acrobat in silver, a performing panther in black, a contortionist in
crimson, a tattooed lady in a white leotard covered with painted
tattoos.

Because it was so hot in the- tent, the two-headed man had removed his
second head: Miranda recognized the Scandinavian prince who had
purchased Saracen.  Smiling, she moved back to check the
midnight-supper buffet.

Inside the house, sackfuls of autumn leaves which had been sitting in
the cellars since October had been lavishly scattered over the floor,
to lend a Sleeping Beauty look to the rooms.  Here, too, artificial
mist rose from the floor.  The furniture of the double drawing room had
been replaced by circular tables set with lavender cloths and eau-
de-Nil linen napkins.  The only light sources were candles in silver
candelabra on every table, each draped with fine silk threads shaped
like cobwebs.

On her way back to the garden tents, Miranda spotted a bare-chested,
turba ned snake-charmer in spangled turquoise harem trousers, talking
to Mike Grant in the hall.

"Scott!"  she cried.

"I'm so glad you were able to fly over.  Pity you couldn't have been
with us for Christmas ... It is Scott, isn't it?  I don't recognize
half my guests in their glamorous outfits."

The snake-charmer kissed Miranda on the cheek.

"Sure it's me.  I wouldn't miss this.  Where's Anna belT "Dancing, I
think.  Easy to see that you two came as a couple!"  Miranda had
already admired Annabel's costume: sister was dressed as a snake.  A
stuffed emerald satin serpent entwined her green-sequined leotard and
tights from her neck to her left ankle.  She wore Alan Jones-style,
scarlet, four-inch heels.

"What are you supposed to be, Mi keT Miranda puzzled.  Although the
name of an excellent theatrical costumier had been slipped in with the
invitations, Mike was weaning black leather motorcycle gear; he carried
a bucket.

"I feed the animals," he explained sheepishly.

"No marks for effort," Miranda said tartly.

"Look how hard everyone else has tried."  She wagged a finger, only
half in jest.

"If you can't manage something better than that, you won't get asked
next year."  Scott said, "Miranda, I'm sure Annabel isn't on the dance
floor.  I've been looking for her for nearly an hour.  Where the hell
could she have go neT "Perhaps she's down at the swimming pool," Mike
suggested.

"No, she won't be there," Miranda said.

"I'm not allowing anyone in my -new pool this evening.  Drunken
revellers may jump in and out of the fountains at Trafalgar Square, but
I don't want them dripping over my newly decorated house."

As she left for the circus tent, she called over her shoulder, "You're
bound to spot Annabel at midnight we're all going to sing "Auld Lang
Sync" in the circus tent before supper starts fbie gras, wild duck, and
quinces baked in a crust!"

"You really should see Miranda's pool," Mike said.

"She's turned the entire basement into a Roman bath.  Not a new one one
that looks as if it had been built two thousand years ago and has just
been excavated and restored.  I bet you've never seen anything like
it."

"Okay, show me," Scott said.

The two men, drinks in hand, sauntered to the elevator.

"Here for lone" Mike asked.

"No, just to see the New Year in."  Scott also intended to see Adam; he
refused to be put off any longer by Adam's excuses.  The bottom line
was that the guy had promised quarterly accounting and it wasn't
happening.  Finally Scott had made it clear to Adam that he was coming
to London to pick up those quarterly reports person ally or find out
why.

Mike stepped from the elevator and felt to the left for the switch that
would light the pool with a dim, eerie radiance.

"Hey, the lights are already on!  I thought Miranda said that nobody
was allowed down here tonight."  Puzzled, he pushed open the cream
doors, and Scott saw the beautiful dark green pool.  The stone columns
were chipped, the vaulted ceiling was crumbling, and the walls looked
as if they had been hacked out of rock.  What looked Eke a natural
spring trickled down into the far end of the pool.  In front of it,
before a semicircle of stone pillars, were mattresses covered by cream
to welling on one of these lay a whip and a ringmaster's top hat; on
another lay a small pile of green clothing.  On an adjoining mattress,
a man and woman were passionately locked in a naked embrace.

Mike's clear, grey, wide-set eyes stared.  As Mike saw who the man was,
he felt disgust rise like bile to his mouth.

And as Scott realized who the woman was, he charged towards the naked
couple, yelling, "You bitch!"

Mike ran after Scott and grabbed his arm, trying to restrain him. Scott
tried to shake Mike off.  The two men grappled, until Scott threw a
hard punch at Mike, glad of an excuse to hit out, to unleash his
violence.

Mike hit Scott hard: as hard as he wanted to hit Adam.  How could Adam
do such a bloody cruel thine.  How could he have taken such a bloody
stupid risk Adam, who had never been seriously involved with a woman?
pott, clumsy in his harem trousers, grappled again with Mike.  They
scuffled, grunting, gasping, and swearing, until one of them slipped on
the wet stone.  Scott's jewelled turban flew off his head and into the
pool.  Both men followed it.

As Annabel and Adam scrambled to their feet, Annabel grabbed a towel.
She was frightened.  But she also felt a fris son of excitement.
Because now, at least, Scott knew but Adam would be unable to say that
Annabel had told him of their secret.  And it had not been her idea to
make love by the pool.  She and Adam had been dancing on the revolving
floor, listening to soft, beguiling music in that dim light.  She had
felt his warm breath on her ear as she listened to his whispered erotic
fantasies ... It had been at Adam's suggestion that they came to the
pool.  No, Adam could not blame her for this.

Annabel grabbed her leotard and her scarlet shoes; abandoning her
stuffed snake, she fled towards the elevator.  She was closely followed
by Adam, who didn't bother about a towel.

By the time a furious Scott pulled himself from the pool, the two naked
lovers had disappeared.  In his dripping harem trousers, Scott ran
after them to the elevator.

Mike's leather gear was too waterlogged to allow him to vault from the
pool, so he swam clumsily towards the stone steps; as he climbed up,
water streamed down his body.  Violently he shook water from his hair,
and it streamed down his leather back.

He unzipped his jacket, threw it on the floor, and shed the rest of his
clothes.  Scott had landed a couple of good punches: Mike's ribs felt
sore.  As he wrapped himself in a towel, another thought occurred to
him.  If Adam always so careful had been caught in a compromising
situation with a woman, then Mike knew that must have been what his
calculating brother intended.  That scene must have

IT7

been I carefully staged.  Adam had planned to be I caught fucking
Annabel.

Why?  Towelling his hair, Mike considered.  Suppose that Adam had
intended Scott to discover his wife's infidelity.  How could he have
planned that?  Simple!  Scott arriving straight from the plane would
naturally have looked for his wife at once.

All Adam needed to do was calculate the earliest time that Scott could
arrive from the airport and then, ten minutes before, start fucking
Annabel's brains out until they were discovered.

If Scott did not find his wife then Miranda always had a big "Auld Lang
Sync" singsong at her New Year's Eve party.  At five minutes to
midnight, at the latest, Miranda would expect Annabel to turn up in the
tent; should her sister be absent, Miranda would send servants all over
the house to find her.

Mike wrapped himself in a cream bath towel and headed for the elevator
to get his coat.  Why would Adam want to cause trouble between Annabel
and her husband?  he wondered.  There had to be some reason.  It was
inconceivable that Adam was in love with Annabel, and he was too smart
to fuck her for no reason.  If he was cited in a divorce, he risked
being landed with a woman he didn't want, so there must be a lot at
stake.  Of course, Annabel was an heiress, but so was Miranda.  Why not
pick the unattached sister if he was after the money?  No.  It had to
be some other reason.  But what?  Fifteen minutes before midnight, as
Miranda was about to send a footman to find Annabel, a maid approached
and whispered a message in her ear.  Miranda followed her upstairs to a
guest bedroom and knocked on the door.

"Scott?  I hear you fell in the pool!"  She laughed.

As he opened the door, Scott growled, "Come inside and lock the
door."

"What's happen ed?"  Miranda could see that Scott, who was wearing a
bathrobe, was furious.  She could also see that he was sober.

"Did you know what was going on, Miranda?  Were you in on this?  Were
you helping the in?"  "I don't understand what the hell you're talking
about.  What's going on.

"I just Mike and I -just saw Adam with Annabel."

"Oh, I was wondering where she'd got to," Miranda said.

"Where was she?"  "They were making love!"  Scott shouted.

"Adam and Annabel!  By your fucking swimming pool!"

Miranda stepped back from his furious face.

"There must be ... You must have made a mistake!"

"Ask Mike!"  Scott roared.

"He saw the whole- fucking thing as well!"

Miranda made a noise that was half gasp, half groan.  She tore off the
golden lion's mask that covered her face.  She felt as if icy fingers
were clawing at her flesh, trying to reach her heart.  She seemed to be
outside her own body, watching it from a height-and a distance: the
true Miranda.  was suspended somewhere near the ceiling, silently
howling with pain and rage at this double betrayal.  That golden body
below her moved, spoke, behaved almost normally, but it felt like a
cold, dead thing.

"Where are they?"

Miranda made a great effort to appear natural.  Scott must on no
account guess her pain, her vulnerability, her stupidity.  Neither
Scott nor anyone else must ever guess that she had allowed Adam to
creep inside her soul and erode it from within.  No one must ever guess
her shame..

"They've both left," Scott said, tight-lipped.

"One of the security men on the door said that two people wrapped in
bathrobes had run out into a waiting Rolls.  Couldn't be anyone else.
They must have gone to his place.  My bitch of a wife wouldn't dare
take that bastard to our suite at the Ritz."

"Are ... are you sure, Scott?"  "Ask Mike if you don't believe me!"
Scott wanted Miranda's comfort, reassurance, and advice not to be
doubted and cross-examined.

Miranda slowly moved to the bedside telephone.  There had to be an
explanation.  Annabel must have thrown herself at Adam.  She must have
taken him by surprise.  He must have been drunk.  It must have been a
mad, lusty, sexual impulse.

But she could not recall ever having seen Adam drunk.  Miranda dialled
an outside number and let it ring for five minutes.

"They're not at Adam's house," she said, "or else he isn't answering."
In the silence, both of them imagined what Annabel and Adam might be
doing.

Violently angry and hurt, Scott said, "I never thought that Annabel ...
She said these trips to England were to see Elinor!  ... Shit!  What a
fool I've been!  ... I wonder how many others there have been.  She's
probably been making a fool of me for years."  He shook his head in
disbelief "I would never have suspected Annabel of cheating on me!"

Miranda said in a cold voice, "Annabel is governed entirely by
self-interest."  Scott spoke wearily.

"I'm going back to the Ritz, to try to get some sleep."  He wanted to
be alone, to curse in a frenzy of impotence, to hammer walls with his
fists.

"If Annabel turns up," Miranda said, suddenly anxious, "don't do
anything rash, Scott.  Don't say anything stupid.  Let me talk to her
first.  Let me try and find out why this is going on and how long it's
been going on."  Her voice was hard.

I Don't worry, I don't want to hit that bitch!  I don't want to, touch
her!"  Scott said.

"And I doubt she'll dare turn up tonight.  She'll obviously stay with
that bastard."  He rubbed his eyes tiredly.

"I'll phone you in the morning.  As soon as I got hold of Annabel,
we're going straight back to New York."  .

"There are a couple of gossip writers downstairs.  I don't want people
to start wondering what's happening to me.

r-,4 better go down and attend to my party."  Miranda was Slad to have
some mechanical role to perform; she would smile brightly, move around,
check that everyone was hapIPily occupied, sing "Auld Lang Sync'.

Usually the last guests lingered until around five in the morning, and
usually Miranda longed for that moment, but tonight she dreaded it.
Because afterwards, she would not be able to avoid thinking.  Firmly
she pushed away memories of Adam's touch, Adam's smell, Adam's
whispered erotic suggestions and the faintly detached way in which he
put them into practice.

THURSDAY, 2 JANUARY 1969

Scott telephoned Miranda to tell her that Annabel, after a
thirty-six-hour absence, had turned up at the Ritz in a white fox coat
and not much else.  If Miranda wanted to knock some sense into her
sister's head, she'd better get around fast because Annabel was
packing.  He was heading for the bar.

"What are you doing here?"  Annabel yelled when Miranda walked into her
bedroom.  She hurled a pile of peach lace into the already crowded
suitcase that lay on the bed.

"You might as well get out of here, if you think I'm going to listen to
one of your lectures!"

"Don't you dare tell me what to do!  Miranda barked.

"I'll do as I please."

"How long has it pleased you to screw Adam?"

"None of your business!"

"Yes it is," Miranda hissed.

"Adam and I have been lovers for over three years."  7 don't believe
youP Annabel shrieked.  She faced her sister.

"The last time we made love was three nights ago."

"I don't believe he loves you!  He couldn't love you!"  Annabel's
certainty returned as she fleetingly remembered the last blissful
thirty-six hours, most of which had been spent in Adam's bed.

"I don't believe he loves you!"  Miranda shouted.

"If anything, you're a one-night stand for Adam.  Has he given you all
the trimming sT "What the hell do you mean by th at?"  Miranda looked
coldly at her sister.

"Does he tickle your nipples with a feather?  Does he slowly lick
between your toes?  Does he run his lips over your entire body, so
lightly that there seems to be only a warm space between your skin and
his mouth?  Does he"

"Shut up!  Shut up!  Shut up!  I don't want to hear any more!"  But
Annabel longed to know more as uncertainty swept over her again.  She
stood staring at Miranda.

"Don't you dare start crying," Miranda said coldly.

"There's no reason why Adam and I shouldn't have an affair.  But you've
deceived your husband as well as your sister!"

"Scott had it coming to him!  And I never meant to deceive you.  I
never knew about you!"

"Well, now you do.  So take your clammy hands off my man!"

"But he's not your man!"  Annabel wailed.

"If Adam really loved you, would he make love to meT Triumphantly she
added, "If he really loves you, then why have you both kept it a
secret?"  None of your damned business," Miranda said with frost io'
her heart.  What a fool she had been to think that Adam loved her
enough to marry her: he hadn't even loved her enough to be faithful.

"Yes it is!  Adam loves me!  We're going to be married!"

"Has he actually asked you to marry him?"  Miranda spat.

Annabel hesitated, then spoke the be with conviction.  Yes."  "Then why
doesn't-A dam tell me?"

"He said the sensible thing was to wait for the fuss to die down.,
Icily Miranda said, "Perhaps we should both see Adam together and let
him clarify his intentions.  Where is he?"  "None of your damned
business."

"Oh, do stop saying that!  If Scott finds Adam and it shouldn't be
difficult he'll tear him apart."

"Scott won't find Adam," Annabel said.  -"Scott has to catch the New
York plane tonight if he doesn't want to miss a broadcast."

"If Adam is hiding from Scott which I doubt, by the way then let's boih
see Adam tomorrow."  Miranda looked more casual than she felt.

"Where is he?"  she asked again.

"I honestly don't know," Annabel lied with equal casualness.

"Perhaps he's still at the Savoy.  That's where we've been staying."

At the back of Miranda's analytical mind, a half-formed thought almost
surfaced: Adam would have had to book well in advance to get a room for
New Year's Eve at the Savoy.

But instead of pursuing this logical thought, she let her attention be
distracted by the violent passion she felt.  Within the past half hour,
her love for her sister had turned to jealous hatred.  Because Miranda
knew that Annabel was right about one thing: if he really loved
Miranda, Adam would not have made love to Annabel.

Suddenly Miranda could understand the feelings ofsomeoone who kills
the person he loves.  She certainly wanted to kill Adam not anonymously
with poison, not suddenly with a gun, but by some slow and painful
method.  She wanted Adam to know that she was responsible for his
death.  She wanted him to suffer the torment that she felt and would
continue to feel.

"I'll find Adam he won't be able to hide for ever."  Miranda threw a
look of hatred at Annabel, then stormed out of the room.

When Scott returned later, Annabel was sitting on a suitcase that
refused to close.

She looked up to find Scott standing just inside the door, looking so
furious and so forlorn she wished she could tell him she was sorry
she'd hurt him because she truly was.

But because of her guilt, she could not be kind to him.

"Miranda told me her side of the story," Scott growled.

"I'd no idea that you could be such an unscrupulous, treacherous
bitch!"

Coldly Annabel said, "Will you shut this damned thing, or do I have to
ring for a porter?"  "Ring, dammit," said Scott.  His hurt pride
battled with anger and humiliation.

"How could you do it to me?  How could you do it to your sis terT "I
never knew that Miranda had this ... this crush on Adam."  Annabel
glared at Scott and thumbed the bell.

"What the hell has this man done to you both?"  Scott asked.

"Hypnotized you?"  "Adam doesn't put his damned career before
everything else!  Before his life!  Before his wife!"

Scott was suddenly deflated.

"Believe me, Annabel, I regret it."

"Adam doesn't take me for granted!"

"So that's how he got to you," Scott said quietly.  Adam 46o given
Annabel the attention that Sco .tt had provided they first met.  Scott
had underestimated Annabel's too of self-confidence when her career
crumbled.  He had briskly attempted to minimize the importance of what
had happened to her.  But Adam had consoled her with flattery.  He had
zeroed in on her insecurity, and his honeyed rcassursince had clearly
repaired the rift in her self-esteem.  Scott took two steps towards
Annabel.

"I never realized I was WgIecting you, angel."

"If you knew how I hate being called "angel"!"

"Then why didn't you say soT Scott yelled.

"What does that bastard Adam call you?"  Scott couldn't believe his
sense of grief, of loss, almost of mourning.  He remembered feeling
like this only once before at his mother's funeral, when much too late
he finally realized he had lost something irreplaceable, something that
he had never known he valued so much..

Remembering his pain, Scott said, "I can't bear to lose you,
Annabel."

"You can't expect me to feel the same way."  Annabel glared at him
again.

"I can't believe that this is happening to us!"  Scott was usually so
astute and observant, yet his wife had been cheating on him for months
and he hadn't noticed.

"Why not?"  Annabel glared.

"It would have been easy for me to screw around at the station.  You
may laugh, but I believed in absolute commitment.  For me, love wasn't
just fucking."

"There hasn't been much of that lately."  Annabel stared impatiently
out of the window.  She couldn't wait to get away.

"It takes two," Scott said.

"Remember how often you visited poor Elinor?"  He added quietly, "We're
both going back to New York together as planned, and we're both going
to forget that this ever happened."

Annabel laughed.

Scotfs calm shattered.  He said sharply, "If you don't ni divorce
you."

"Go ahead."  Annabel laughed again.  No more lies.  No" more cover-ups.
No more alibis.  No more guilt.  She would be free to marry Adam.  And
if that was the case, she was convinced he would marry her.

Adam wasn't at the Savoy and of course he wouldn't stay in his own
home, where she and Scott could badger him, Miranda thought.

Where could that bastard hide, an unexpected guest, for an indefinite
period over the holiday season in quiet and comfortable anonymity?
Suddenly she knew where he was hiding.  There was one person who would
always protect Adam, no matter what he had done.

Twenty minutes later, Miranda rang the bell of the dignified cream
house in Eaton Terrace.

When Mike's butler answered the door, she said quietly, "Please tell
Mr.  Adam Grant that Miss O'Dare is a little early for her
appointment."  Once inside the house, instead of waiting in the hall,
Miranda silently followed the manservant up the carpeted stairs to the
second floor.

The butler paused at a bedroom door.  Before he could knock, she had
twisted the brass handle, ducked under his arm, and burst into the
room.

Seated before the mustard brocade curtains of the bedroom window, Adam
was studying a page of figures.

He looked up in surprise.

"What are you doing here, Miranda?"  As he spoke, Adam slipped the
sheet of paper between the cushion and the side of the chair so that it
was hidden.

"I might ask the same of you!"  Miranda said hotly.

"Thank you, Forbes."  Adam waited until the door had "Ooed.  Then, with
apparent sincerity, he said, "I'm sorry you had to find out this way,
Miranda.  I'm truly sorry I've made such a mess of things for you."  I
As painfully as if she had just stepped barefoot on a hedgehog, Miranda
again felt the destructive spikes of jealousy.  Tormented and miserable
to the point of frenzy, she burst out, "Why did you do it this way,
Adam?  That's what I don't understand.  Do you love Annabel?"

"I am not going to discuss my feelings for Annabel with you or anyone
else," Adam said.  He stood up and looked coldly at Miranda.

Her jealousy flared.  She flow across the room and lashed out at him
with her fists.

Adam easily caught her wrists.  Miranda found herself powerless to
shake them free.  She kicked at his ankle and hit his shinbone.  When
he winced from the pain, she tried to bite his hands.  Adam swiftly
shifted his grip so that he held Miranda's face against his chest while
firmly grasping her wrists behind her.

She found it difficult to move.  Her check was pressed against him.
Hatred, burning rage, and pain consumed her.

"Let me go, you bastarff She twisted upward and managed to clamp her
teeth on his chin.

Adam jerked his head back.  With satisfaction, Miranda saw blood run
from his chin.

Barely concealing the fury in his voice, Adam said, "I'll let you go
when I feel like it.  You're about to find out who's in control, you
careless, stupid little bitch."

"I'd remind you that I'm in control of the company!  I'm your boss!"

"I shouldn't be too sure," Adam spat.

"Why should you have so large a part of the company that I've done so
much to build upP "You got a quarter of a million pounds" worth of
shares for that!  And you get a damned good salary!  Let me go!"

Adam tightened his grip.

"I'm sorry to tell you that I not only wished to have more of the
business but I also wished you to have less."

"L--t me go!"  Miranda desperately tried to pull free of him: her
wrists were burning now and tears of pain sprang to her eyes.

"By God, I'll fire you, Adam!"

"No.  You can'tfire me, Miranda."

"I don't know what the hell you mean, Adam, but as soon as I get out of
here, I'm going to telephone my solicitors and find out just how
quickly I can terminate your contract."

"In that case, Miranda, please remember to tell your solicitors that
you no longer have a controlling interest in the company."

"What the hell do you meanT "Remembering your extensive knowledge of
company law, I'm sure you know that the biggest shareholder virtually
controls a company."

"Yes, and that's me."

"You are mistaken, Miranda.  I now control the biggest shareholding in
SUPPLY KITS  Forty-six per cent!  And you can't do a thing about it!
You have a choice, of course: you can either leave the company or you
can work your ass off to provide me with a splendid income for the rest
of my life."  In fact, Adam now planned to sell all his shares before
leaving for Rio.

"You must be mad," Miranda gasped, still trying to free herself from
Adam's grip.  She managed to kick him again, and he winced.

"No," he said between gritted teeth, "I'm telling you the truth, my
darling.  You and your bloody family are about to be wiped out."

Adam quickly twisted Miranda so that her back was against his chest. He
then moved backwards, towards the door of the room, dragging her with
him.  She fought "wodly against his grip and heard her coat rip as they
wuggled.

Miranda panted, "You can't do anything to my family."  She wished she'd
thought of kneeing Adam in the groin while she was facing him.  She
waited until he had to use one hand to open the door, then gave a
vicious kick backwards and once more hit his leg bone.  He grunted with
pain but did not release her.  I "You'll find I can do something to
your family, "Adam said, gritting his teeth again as he tightened his
hold on Miranda.

"What do you mean.21 But Adam had already said more than he intended.
Still gripping Miranda's wrists painfully, he frog marched her down the
wide, maroon-carpeted stairway.

The butler appeared in the hall.  He quickly concealed his astonishment
and, at Adam's curt request, politely opened the door.

Adam shoved Miranda out, between the elegant Doric columns that guarded
the steps to the street.

The front door slammed behind her.  As,she clutched a column to steady
herself and hailed an approaching taxi, Miranda remembered Adam's
parting words.

Exactly what could Adam do to her family?  She felt a lurch in her
stomach, a feeling she had often experienced when he took her in his
arms but this time it was a lurch of fear.

Miranda suddenly remembered that Adam had made the arrangements to set
up the Dove Trust.  Suppose Buzz was right and Elinor was being
deliberately kept in a drug induced stupor so that Adam could do as he
pleased wit her money?  "You all right, lo veT asked the taxi driver as
he stopped at the kerb.

Miranda, angry and worried, telephoned for an emergency appointment
with Mr.  Worthington, senior partner of Swithin, Timmins and Grant.

In his sunny, dusty office, Mr.  Worthington reminded her that STG had
relinquished control of the Dove Trust, at her grandmother's specific
request.

"I appreciate that," Miranda said, "but I've come to ask you to find
out what's happening to the trust now."  Mr.  Worthington said
politely, "Regrettably, STG cannot be involved because there's a
conflict of interest between the parties concerned even though Adam
Grant and Paul Littlejohn are no longer connected with STG."

"But couldn't you tell me what you think might have happened?  Off the
record?"  Mr.  Worthington hesitated.

"Strictly off the record ... after what you've told me ... there might
be a possibility of embezzlement, arranged so that it is not illegal."
Bitterly Miranda said, "I expect that two international lawyers, who've
worked together for years, wouldn't find it difficult to legally
defrauda client who trusted them.  But can't a trust be bro kenT "Often
the reason for setting up a trust is specifically so that it cannot be
broken," Mr.  Worthington said.

"Of course, when the trust deeds were originally drawn up, it would
have been possible to insert special trust-breaking clauses.  But had
Adam Grant intended, at that stage, to defraud the beneficiaries, then
he would have been careful to insert no such clauses.  If I were you, I
would immediately get a good lawyer to check the trust deeds."

CHAPTER 25

FRIDAY, 3 JANUARY 1969

What do you want to see me about, Miranda?"  As Miranda 'idtered his
office, the Earl of Brighton rose from behind a 'black leather desk.  A
thin, stooped figure, he unhooked his gold-rimmed half-spectacles from
rather large ears and moved forward with a tentative, shambling walk;
he looked far more amiable and far less intelligent than he was.

Briefly Miranda told Lord Brighton what Adam had said to her about
SUPPLY KITS  She tried to sound dalm, reasonable, and businesslike,
explaining that she was there for one purpose only to see that Adam did
not control the company.

"What's his shareholdine."  Lord Brighton asked.

"I went to the registrar myself, James, to check the shareholders. Adam
holds only fifteen per cent of the shares the fifteen per cent that he
bought from me on option and the shares he was entitled to buy at the
one-for-three rights issue."

"But Adam might control some of the other shareholders h " romised a
few big shareholders some special inC S P ducement provided they vote
with him."

"The biggest single holding belongs to a firm called Highland Croft
Holdings.  Have you ever heard of them?  My broker hasn't."

"No.  It's certainly not a publicly quoted company," Lord Brighton
said, "but even if Adam does control forty-six per vent of the shares,
as he claims, if there's a real showdown he won't control the company
because he needs over fifty per cent to do that."

"What can I do?  How can I stop Adam controlling the other four or
five per cent?"  "We need more information," Lord Brighton said.

Miranda hesitated.

"Perhaps I should also now tell you, in confidence, that I don't
particularly want to control SUPPLY KITS  I'm not interested in
acquiring businesses.  I'm really interested in only one business KITS.
"She spoke with determination: "I don't want to be the figurehead of a
public company.  I want to be the real head of my own company! Ideally,
I'd like to own one hundred per cent of the KITS shares."

"So you want to purchase KITS from SUPPLY KITS Miranda nodded.

"If KITS again became a private company, I could develop the business
as I wish.  I could make long-term plans without constant pressure to
provide quick profits.  And I wouldn't find my hands tied by some
overcautious director who's terrific at pushing figures around on paper
but doesn't understand the cosmetics business."  Lord Brighton said,
"As chairman, I don't feel that SUPPLY KITS should let you go at this
stage."  Miranda played what she hoped was her trump card.

"I would only be prepared to stay on as managing director provided I
could buy back KITS."  Lord Brighton leaned back in his chair and
stared through the window at the river traffic silently drifting on the
ochre water of the Thames.  Reflectively he said, "We've just had that
valuation of KITS."  Miranda smiled.

"Leases and stock, less debts, are valued at fourteen thousand
pounds."

"That's a very low figure.  What about the value of the goodwill?"
Miranda said firmly, "The goodwill of KITS is so bound up with my
public image that it'd be difficult for the accountants to put a price
on the goodwill if I'm not there.  If SUPPLY KITS dares to ask me to
pay a premium for XF Irs then I will immediately resign from SUPPLY'
Which as I've said, SUPPLY KITS can't afford at the moment," Lord
Brighton said.

"As the face of the firm, you are publicly perceived to be responsible
for the success of SUPPLY KITS  If you went, the share price would
undoubtedly fall.  SUPPLY KITS can't afford to lose you or have any
rival company acquire your services."  IExactly, James.  But I want to
make it clear to you that I intend to withdraw gradually from SUPPLY
KITS  The company is now established, and my deputy, Alex Stanton, can
take over as MD."

"Then I assume you'd like SUPPLY KITS to call an EGMT An extraordinary
general meeting was the only way that such a matter could be decided. 
As fast as possible, please."

"We need to give three weeks" notice of an EGM.  Let's hold it on
Friday, thirty-first January, which gives us a week extra."  Miranda
nodded.  Official approval to sell KITS back to her must come from
bank, stockbroker, and stock exchange, after which the circular had to
be printed and posted to all shareholders.

As he escorted Miranda to the door, Lord Brighton added" By the way,
Adam Grant should be informed as fast as possible.  We'll then know his
reaction well in advance."

"Could you telephone him, Jam esT Lord Brighton nodded.

"I could also tactfully bring up that other matter of who holds the
controlling interest claimed by Grant.  He'll have to give me a
truthful answer, evade the question, or lie: any of those possibilities
will be interesting-I "If he doesn't control those shares, I can fire
him."  Miranda was no longer able to maintain her carefully
businesslike facade; her voice shook.

"You can't fire Grant just because you feel like doing so," Lord
Brighton warned.

"He's a director of a public company.  Officially, you haven't
complained about him and I'm not sure that you even have the right to
complain about his behaviour: Grant has been very successful at his
job, and he's entitled to acquire as many shares as he can like any
other member of the public.  Be careful, Miranda, to keep your feelings
under control."

"I can still dream," Miranda said.

"If you need me for anything, I'll be in Paris early next week for the
Cosmetics Safety Conference.  At the Ritz, as usual."  When Lord
Brighton telephoned, Adam listened in silence as he was told of the
purpose of the EGM.  Reminded of the book valuation of KITS, he said
angrily, "With the greatest respect, that's giving KITS away.  The
reason KITS is currently worth so little on paper is because it's been
our cash cow we've milked it to finance our expansion in other
areas."

"I believe that's one of the things Miranda objects to."

Adam snapped, "What Miranda forgets or maybe she doesn't is that in a
couple of years, KITS will once again be worth a fortune!  So whatever
Miranda O'Dare offers for KITS I'll offer ten per cent more."  Lord
Brighton telephoned Miranda with this news.  He added, "Of course, I'll
have to include Grant's counter bid in my letter to the shareholders,
but in view of the other considerations, I shall still recommend
acceptance of your offer, Miranda.  However, the decision doesn't
depend on my views it depends on the votes.  And, as interested
parties, neither you nor Adam will be allowed to vote, nor will
shareholders controlled by either of you."

"Does that mean assuming Adam's telling the truth about controlling
forty-six per cent that the decision will f outside shareholders?  be
made by only the nine per cent o "It does."

Adam and I allowed to lobby the shareholder sT I, careful," Lord
Brighton warned again.

"You don't want to overexcite the press.  The share price might drop if
it looked as though the directors were squabbling among themselves
instead of efficiently running the company."

"Don't worry," Miranda said grimly.

"I'll be careful."

"By the way, I checked on Highland Croft Holdings.  The company is
apparently owned by an offshore holding company, so we can't trace it
further.  They own four point eight per cent of SUPPLY KITS and there's
no way of telling whether those shares are among the percentage that
Grant claims to control."

SATURDAY, 4 JANUARY 1969

Although it was past midday, the only light in the room entered through
a chink in the mustard brocade curtains.

They lay silent once more, enjoying closeness.  Adam felt that he knew
the body beside him almost as well as he knew his own feelings,
reactions, and needs.  And his partner knew precisely what aroused the
force of Adam's passion.  Slowly each in turn, with the utmost
tenderness, softly kissed the other's body and face ... lips, nose,
eyelids ... and each trembled beneath the other's touch.

Afterwards, as they lay side by side and mouth to mouth, their bodies
still intertwined, Adam cherished the closeness and subtle tenderness
that made him feel the two of them had just fused into one person.  For
him, it had been an all-encompassing, overwhelming experience of
soaring rapture, total understanding, and bliss, emotional as well as
physical.

Adam sometimes wondered whether as he had many times been told he had
lost the capacity to feel, whether it had really been cauterized away
before he was old enough to realize it.  But he never had such
misgivings when he lay enfolded in these arms: here he was always
totally involved; he never felt as if, from above, he were
dispassionately watching himself manipulate his partner towards
spasm.

In these arms, Adam felt as if he were at last truly in touch and at
peace with himself as he both gave and received.  He felt loving and
trusting as, in turn, he was loved and trusted.  Adam knew this to be
true intimacy.

His arms tightened around the smooth shoulders.  In the clear, grey,
wide-set eyes, so close to his, Adam could see not only his reflection:
he could see that this was the person with whom he belonged, the only
person with whom he felt at peace, without pretence, and free.  He felt
tremendous joy.

SUNDAY, 5 JANUARY 1969

After seeing Lord Brighton, Miranda spent two sleepless nights thinking
about Adam's triple treachery and worrying about the future of SUPPLY
KITS and the Dove Trust.  She couldn't cancel her trip to Paris, but
luckily she was only billed to make the opening speech at the
conference, and for those two days she was determined to forget her
problems, and be professional.

On Sunday morning, the sky was cloudy.  Gatwick Airport informed
Miranda that the cloud base on her route would be around fifteen
hundred feet, with a risk of icing at that level.  On a more cheerful
note, the operator added that there might be a layer of clear sky
between three thousand and four thousand feet.  Luckily, Miranda had
recently acquired her pilot's instrument rating, which permitted her to
climb through cloud in weather such as this.

At ten a.m."  Miranda's new plane, a pale blue Beechcraft Bonanza, took
off from Redhill for Lydd, where she would clear customs.

But the higher the Bonanza climbed, the worse the a.oftther became.
That layer of clear sky must be a lot Uglier than forecast, Miranda
thought crossly, realizing that, as she couldn't see through the cloud
that now surrounded the plane, she was committed to an instrument
fight.  Unfortunately, Gatwick Met had been right about the ice.  At
four thousand feet, Miranda couldn't raise the Jo,wer or any other
airport, because ice had built up on the cabin, and when it separated,
it damaged the cominunications radio aerial: the Bonanza had no contact
with ground control.  Miranda, who had been relying on air traffic
control for navigation, could no longer receive instructions from the
controller.

The Bonanza's air speed indicator, compass, and all instruments that
didn't rely on radio were working.  However, Miranda was now flying a
very basically equipped aeroplane in some trouble.  In an emergency
situation, she would have to continue to follow her- last instruction
from ground control.  She cheered herself up by thinking that ground
control could still see her on their radar and they would know she
had'a problem, because she wasn't answering them.

Although Miranda knew exactly in which direction she was flying, she
did not know her precise position, although she reckoned she was
somewhere over the South Downs.  So th here was no question of putting
the plane down, for she risked hitting high ground.  She had better
stay at four thousand feet and hope for a clear patch of sky below her,
which would allow her to see the ground and check her bearings.

Miranda's plan was to descend, slowly and carefully, over the sea near
Lydd airport.  She hoped that there was no low cloud there, because she
then risked hitting the water.  A crash landing, in January, in the
English Channel would be fatal: she was unlikely to be rescued and
wouldn't last twenty minutes in such cold water.

As she flew on in thick, oppressive cloud, Miranda felt increasingly
lonely.  She cursed herself for having climbed above fifteen hundred
feet instead of flying below the cloud base: she should have been more
cautious.

After flying for about twenty minutes, she calculated that Lydd lay
directly ahead.  Firmly pushing anxiety out of her mind, she started a
slow descent to three thousand feet ... two thousand ... nine hundred
... Still the Bonanza remained enveloped by white cloud.

Nervously Miranda took the plane down to seven hundred feet ... then to
five hundred: white silence still enshrouded it.

As she peered ahead, straining to see, one of her contact lenses
started to irritate her eye.  She blinked repeatedly as she went down
to four hundred feet ... then three hundred.  Even at this low level,
the light was dull and the cloud persisted.

Miranda screwed her eyes up and again peered downwards, unsuccessfully
searching the opaque cloud below.

At just above two hundred feet, she saw a change in the colour of
cloud.  Yes, it was definitely.  darker.

Then she saw ... the tops of trees.  Although visibility, bad when
Miranda started her journey, had since deteniorated, at least she could
see where she was going as the Bonanza slowly flew lower.

Now, where was Lydd?  Miranda peered at the ground below, hoping to see
a town or a road that she could pinpoint on the map that lay on her
lap.

She stared, then blinked.  She couldn't believe what she saw.  It
wasn't possible to be so lucky!  Dead ahead of the Bonanza just visible
in the distance an airport runway bisected the dirty green ground.
Miranda felt a wave of relief run, like electricity, through her entire
body and out to her fingertips, which started to tingle as her
adrenalin level decreased.

,."Ow knew exactly where she was!  She was approaching 0 far boundary
of the hedged field that lay about a quarter of a mile east of Lydd
airport.  She was going to make it!  Her face relaxed a little as she
put down her landing gear at just over two hundred feet.

As Miranda adjusted from blind flying on instruments -visual flight,
her contact lens again started to irritate her She approached the
runway.  Her height was now one bun dred feet ... fifty feet, she
reckoned.  But because her eye was watering, Miranda miscalculated: she
was flying much lower than she thought.  Just short of the runway, the
Bonanza's landing gear hit the top of the hedge on the airport
boundary.

As the nose of the plane jerked abruptly downwards, Miranda
instinctively corrected by pulling the stick back fast.  With crumpled
landing gear, the plane skimmed over the ground and leaned to the left;
the wing touched ground, and the plane slewed around in a
half-circle.

As the left wing buckled, Miranda, who hadn't pulled her seat belt
quite tight enough, was thrown forward.  Her head hit the top of the
instrument panel.

SATURDAY, 25 JANUARY 1969

The thin woman in the violet coat planted a farewell kiss on Adam's
cheek and moved away from the restaurant table.

Annabel smiled.

"Don't tell me that was one of your clients."  She leaned across and,
with her handkerchief, scrubbed the blackberry lipstick from his
cheek.

"No, she's a lingerie buyer for Harvey Nichols.  Do you remember Johnny
Briar?"  "That man at Lloyd's?  Your friend who went bankrupt?"

"Yes.  He and Nora were divorcing, but she took him back when Johnny
had his nervous breakdown."  Adam stood up.

"I'd better not be late."

"You work too hard," Annabel said seriously.

"Who is this client who needs you on Saturday afternoon?"

"An important Jap."  Adam blew her a kiss.

Annabel watched him pause for a few words at almost all the
pale-yellow-spotlit tables as he worked his way towards the entrance of
the fashionable Arethusa Club.

As Annabel ordered more coffee, a man approached her table.

"Roger!  How nice to see you.  Coffee?"  He was an acquaintance from
her debutante days, tall but no longer slim, with thinning fair hair. 
He wore the fashionable art director's uniform: black turtleneck
sweater, hipster trousers, and a leather, brass-buckled belt that might
have been taken from a cart-horse.

"I was sorry to read about Miranda's accident.  How is she?"  Roger sat
down and removed his heavy, horn-rimmed spectacles.

"She's slowly recovering," Annabel said, fighting back tears.  She
tried not to think about Miranda.

Roger said, "You girls were great fun, and you were all very nice to
me."

"You were always great fun.  And so was Lady Rushleigh, I mean Mrs.
Bromley."

"I think Aunt Sonia hoped I'd marry an heiress.  But I didn't.  I
hadn't yet found that I didn't belong in that world, although plenty of
people made it plain enough."  He smiled ruefully.

"Wasn't that Adam Grant who just left?"  "Yes."  Annabel brightened at
the mention of her beloved's name.

"What's one of my favourite girls doing with a man like that?  I know
it's none of my business, but, for old time's sake, be careful."

"Be careful of what, Roger?"  "Perhaps you don't know Adam as well as I
do," Roger "Xg carefully.

"We were at prep school together, and schoolboys rarely change.  They
may turn into art directors and la'ers, but behind the grown-up
disguises, basic character doesn't much alter.  Did you ever meet
Adam's mother, by the way?"  Yes, although I don't remember her well.
She was very severe, very formal, not easy to know; a bit chilling like
the Duchess of Windsor."  "A tough old bird."  Roger nodded.

"She held the reins in at family.  Her father was the boss of the
business, and she never let anyone forget that.  I've always wondered
whether Adam inherited his impersonal attitude from Iter or whether he
had to develop a shell to protect himself from her coldness."

"I've never noticed it."  Annabel smiled.

"Surely you've noticed that, like the Ice Queen, Adam's heart is frozen
and he cannot fee lT

Annabel said cheerfully, "I think Adam and his heart are wonderful!"

"But unfeeling," Roger repeated earnestly.

"Adam doesn't want to feel and he despises anyone who does.  He knows
that to have feelings would make him vulnerable.  Any warm impulse of
his heart alarms him."

"What are you getting at?"  Annabel was puzzled.

Roger started to speak faster: "The nearest Adam gets to feeling
anything is the pursuit of power.  That's what excites him.  Adam loves
money because it brings power.  He can rely on money that's why he can
never get enough of ill"

"Does Adam owe you money?"  Annabel asked, bewildered and a bit
cross.

"Of course Adam owes me money or rather my agency.  Adam owes money to
everyone," Roger said.

"He collected a debt for us from a defaulting client, then invoiced us
for rather more than he collected."  He gave an unfriendly laugh.

"But that sort of behaviour doesn't worry Adam.

After all, he grew up seeing that a shrewd lawyer can got away with
anything."

"I don't have anything to do with Adam's busiuess," Annabel said
coldly.  She stood up to leave.

Roger jumped up and caught hold of her wrist.  11 shouldn't be too
sure.  Adam doesn't touch anything that isn't business."

"Let go of my wrist!"

"If you listen to me.  I've heard you're very fond of Adam."

"Yes."  Annabel's voice was curt.

"Be careful, Annabel.  I'd hate to see you hurt.  Remember kow
secretive Adam is.  There's a reason for that."

Annabel hesitated.  She felt she shouldn't listen to this man abuse
Adam, but she also felt an irresistible urge, like Pandora with the
box, to hear what he had to say.

"Plenty of people are secretive," she said.

"Especially lawyers."

"Adam isn't secretive because he's a cautious lawyer" Roger shook his
head' but because he's basically selfish.  Adam doesn't want to share
anything, with anyone."

"Why are you telling me this?"  Annabel asked again, trying to tug her
wrist away.

"Because I like you.  Because I don't like Adam, and I've good reason
for that."  fWhat makes you such an expert on Ada mT "You should ask
him," Roger advised.

"And you should remember that Adam has a nasty habit of dumping people
when he has no further use for them."

Annabel said, "Perhaps you don't know that Adam and I ... I "Of course
I know!  That's why I'm telling you this.  I also i know about his
affair with Miranda."  That was enough!  She was leaving.  Annabel
again twisted to free herself from his grasp.

48o k Annabel, I don't want you to be hurt."  As Roger .. AZ her wrist,
he looked at her sadly.

"Open those I eyes," he said calmly.

"Please!  Look at how he's using you, manipulating you.  This is not
something new; lies always done it to both women and men.  Believe me
.4 --1 know."  spite of Annabel's fury, she paused.  Roger's quiet,
jjjjisoling voice had the chilling ring of truth.

don't believe he's ever really loved anyone," Roger said.

"Maybe Miranda, for a while.  She's the only woman who almost got.
under Adam's guard.  I suspect that was Why she lasted so long.
Generally Adam likes to make a "W,oman dependent upon him, then dump
her straight away.

uses much the same technique with men."  With men?"  Annabel asked,
confusion and indignation in her voice.

"What do you meanT "Annabel, Adam is bisexual.  He likes women and men
or maybe, more to the point, he dislikes them both equally.  Either
way, he seems to be masterly at sex with both.  As I said, Annabel, I
know." "Surely you don't mean ... ?  Why, that's preposterous!" 
Annabel seemed dazed, caught between anger and shock.  She stared at
Roger and saw long-forgotten pain and rejection in his eyes. 
Desperately she turned towards the door.  How dare Roger suggest that
Adam and he ... Roger hurried behind her.

"If you want proof, Adam has one night a week he tries to save, for the
boys," he said.

"He usually goes to the Hilbury Arms a pub in St.  Martin's Lane on
Saturday evenings.  That's the big night.  And if you decide to go
don't bother to show up before nine o'clock that's when the action
starts."

CHAPTER 26

SATURDAY, 25 JANUARY 1969

Annabel spent an agonized afternoon racked by indecision.  She was torn
between her need to check on Roger's story and the need to ignore the
painful seed of suspicion that he had sown.  Finally, at eight o'clock
that evening, the need to know won out and she took a cab to St.
Martin's Lane.

In a navy mackintosh and with a navy scarf pulled down around her face,
Annabel stood on the dark, rain-splashed pavement, which was almost
deserted: the theatre crowds were now inside, watching the plays.

Annabel looked across the road.  The exterior of the Hilbury Arms was
dark green; the name was painted on the faa de in elaborate gold
carnival lettering; the brightly lit, frosted windows looked
inviting.

Hands in pockets, feet gradually growing numb from cold, Annabel stood
there for over half an hour.  She was frightened of her own feelings.
Sexual rage and jealousy had swept over her in a violent, scarcely
controllable flood of emotion that threatened to engulf her: she felt
as crazy and unbalanced as when she first fell in love with Adam.  Why
on earth was she standing here?  This was ridiculous.  She kept telling
herself that nothing had happened to make her doubt Adam, who was
dining with a client.  How could she not trust the man she loved?  Why
did she feel so jealous, after listening to a malicious troublemaker's
spiteful gossip?  She should have refused to listen.  She should go
back to Adam's flat now.

But Annabel had to know.  U id f never knowing the truth was worse than
her ca o iy.  This thought propelled her across the road and rough the
revolving doors of the Hilbury Arms.  Someone behind Annabel said,
"Excuse me," and she was pushed farther inside the pub.  Nearly
everybody was clustered around the long, curved mahogany bar, although
th pre was plenty of room elsewhere.  A pall of cigarette almost
blotted out the bitter smell of stale hops.  his lamps with malachite
glass shades hung from a ceiling by smoke.  A Billie Holiday recording
floated words ipf sadness and need above the steady babble of voices.

Annabel stared about her.  A group of young men in the back corner
looked like any suburban boys waiting outside cinema for their
girlfriends.  Some of the young men at the far end of the bar looked
like art students, in black Jeans and turtleneck sweaters; some wore
black paramilitary clothes or black leather jackets; a cluster of
good-looking, well-groomed men sitting on barstools might have been
sctors.  One, a Cliff Richard look-alike with a scornful expression,
snapped at anyone who drifted up to him.  Annabel did not spot any
other women.

She sat down shakily just inside the door.  Wishing she could be
invisible, she listened to the snatches of conversation.

"Not much in 'ere tonight, Georgie, let's go to the Colcheme .. ."I
wouldn't mind that down the lock-up .. ."

"Eyes off, sonny, this one's mine."

"Fancy a spot of .. ."

"I think perhaps you're a little bit interested in my friend George.
Right, squire?"

As Billie Holiday's voice continued to moan of love and irony, Adam
walked in, passing Annabel without seeing her as she hid in the corner
shadows.  He bounded towards the bar.  The boy who looked like Cliff
Richard stared disdainfully at him.  Adam eagerly pushed through the
crowd to the boy's side.  He kissed him on the lips, held him in a long
caress.

on trembling legs, Annabel jumped up from her seat and dashed through
the door, back into the night.  Her hands shook and she felt sick.

"Bastard!  Bastard!  Bastardt" she screamed as she ran along the wet
pavements and the rain slashed down on her.

SUNDAY, 26 JANUARY 1969

Miranda slowly put her hand to her head, and felt bandages.  She opened
her eyes, just a crack, and saw a small, cream-coloured hospital room
filled with flowers.

"My headache seems to have gone," Miranda murmured to the nurse who
checked her pulse.  When she first recovered consciousness the worst
pain she ever felt had sizzled through her head.

Now Miranda's head seemed filled with clear, pure air.

"When can I leave this place?"  she whispered.

"Not yet," the nurse said firmly.

"You've made good progress in the past two days, but you've had a
severe concussion and it's only been twenty-one days since your
accident "Twenty-one days!"

"Keep calm you mustn't get excited.  The doctor's instructions were to
keep you sedated.  You've had ten milligrams of Valium every four
hours, which is why you had those swim my daydreams as you came round,
but we've been cutting it down for the last two days.  That's why
you're more alert this morning."

"Does my office know I'm he re?"

The nurse laughed.

"Your telephone calls keep our switchboard permanently occupied.  Your
secretary's staying at the Grand Hotel.  She's posted a bodyguard
outside this door, to stop the press harassing you.  I'm afraid there
have been a few silly stories in the tabloids."

"Damn!"

Buster Annabel has visited several times and tel eat least twice a
day." .4.4,don't want to see her!  Please see she isn't let in!"  Don't
get excited.  You needn't see anyone you don'tt to see."  t happened to
my plane?  Did it catch fire?  How did I out?"  "Your plane didn't
catch fire, and it's being repaired.  The airport fire-and-rescue team
pulled you out: they said ya .a were lucky the door didn't stick.  Your
secretary has all the newspaper clippings."

"I need a telephone straight away."

"I'm sorry, not until tomorrow.  Doctor's orders."  you don't bring me
a phone, I'm going to call the bodyguard and have him carry me to one,"
Miranda said.

1 1must make just a couple of calls."

After further argument, in order to calm the patient's growing
agitation, the staff sister agreed that Miranda could have the
telephone trolley for fifteen minutes.

Her secretary wasn't at her hotel, so Miranda dialled Lord Brighton's
number.

"Hello ... no, James, I'm fine.  Pay no attention to newspaper stories.
I want to know what's happening about the EGM.  What's the proxy
situation?"  "The proxy votes have started to arrive, but we haven't
received as many as I expected.  Perhaps the shareholders are going to
turn up at the EGM ... No, we haven't had proxies from Highland Croft
Holdings, but don't let it worry you."

"How can I help worrying, James!  Highland Croft Holdings will decide
the vote!  Their four point eight per cent leaves only four point two
of other voting shareholders as Adam and I can't vote the shares we
control."

"Perhaps they plan to send a representative to the meeting."

"Or perhaps they're waiting until the last minute, when they'll
auction those shares between me and Adam for an enormous premium, on
condition that Highland Croft votes for the agreed purchaser who will,
of course, not buy until after the EGM."

"That's right.  If either you or Adam buys those shares he fore the
meeting, then, as interested parties, you won't be able to use the
votes."  Grimly Miranda said, "If Adam gets control of that block of
shares, then I ran kiss KITS goodbye.  So I'll be forced to buy them,
no matter what the price.  I'll borrow against my existing shareholding
to raise the cash."

"You're clearly recovering," Lord Brighton said.

"I made sure no one would trace my query to you, but Higkland Croft is
not prepared to sell."

"They're saying that to drive the price up!"

"There's nothing to be gained by worrying.  Don't forget that, without
you, KITS wouldn't be nearly such an interesting proposition.  Adam
can't see that because he isn't objective at the moment.  I assume he's
so used to getting his own way that he's forgotten how to, handle
himself when he can't."

As Miranda replaced the telephone, a nurse entered.

"You have a visitor.  She's telephoned every day.  A Miss Buzz."

"Buzz!  How wonderfulP "Only ten minutes, mind," the nurse said.

Miranda looked up at the angular figure and burst into tears.

"A fine mess you're in!"  Buzz took Miranda's hand.

"My poor girlie.  Ain't seen you cry since you was six years old, when
you fell out of the beech tree, remember?  There, there ... tell old
Buzz about it."

"Oh, Buzz, everything is such a mess.  I thought I was so clever, but
I've been so stupid.  I've only just realized..  ."  that can't There's
nothing wait 7Won't fret, my girlie o, Buzz!  This can't wait!  ... I
should've listened to I think Adam is keeping Gran in that place and
stealing her money."  Briefly Miranda outlined her suspicions.  so
1hat's what he's been up to with all them fancy schemes," Buzz said
sourly.

"Nell should have put her money the Woolwich that's where my salary
goes: safely tucked-"It:way in a building society ... What are we to
do, my girl?"  "Can't you get her out of there, Buzz?  I don't think we
should wait until I'm fit enough, and I don't trust anyone -else." 
Buzz brightened.

"We mustn't let them have any warning.  That matron could arrange a
compulsory detention order, which'd keep Nell there for another month
while the nursing home tidies up its records, of course."

"Can't you sneak in and get her out somehow?"  "Not me.  That matron
wouldn't let me in again!"

Miranda stopped snuffling as a thought occurred to her.

"What's the time?  ... If it's eight in the morning here, then it's
late last night in Los Angeles.  I'm going to phone Sam and find out
where Clare is."  Instead of the usual operator's delay, within a few
minutes Miranda was connected to Sam, to whom she quickly told her
story.

Sam said, "I never trusted that bastard Adam.  Too smooth and
agreeable.  That persuasive, masterful air, that total assurance of his
all the things you women liked about him were the things that made me
distrust him."

"Maybe you've had more experience with con men."

"Yeah, they're a dime a dozen on the West Coast."

"Do you know where I can find ClareT "Sure.  I make a point of knowing
what she's up to.  She's gone skiing with Josh.  Klosters, I think. But
Clare can't handle this!  She's no match for a crooked lawyer."

"Sam, you're so strong, so capable, so experienced, such a knw-it-all
... "Let me think ... Luckily, we've just finished post production
work. I can catch a plane tomorrow.  First we rescue Elinor, then we go
for Adam.  I'll be happy to help you do both."

TUESDAY, 28 JANUARY 1969

Still wearing her yellow ski outfit and suede-soled orange socks, Clare
looked around her new bakery with satisfaction.  David had designed the
extension, built on to the side of the kitchen.  Next to the two
professional ovens were slatted cooling shelves.

A month of Swiss sunshine had tanned Clare's skin, and her aquamarine
eyes sparkled.  She glowed with health after her first Proper holiday
in four years; she had enjoyed every minute of it.

Clare returned to the kitchen, pulled a cheese tart from the
refrigerator, and put it in the oven to warm for lunch.  Through the
back window, she could.  see the new toboggan that David had bought in
Klosters.  After school, Josh and his gang would take it up on the
snow-covered hill behind the cottage.

Clare now had a luxurious, five-hour period before she started to
prepare for that night's baking.  She wandered into the sitting room
and put a record on the stereo David had given her for her thirtieth
birthday.  Somewhat guiltily, she enjoyed the peaceful feeling of being
alone in the cottage.  She sat down and put her feet up on the brass
fender before the log fire.  As she dreamily watched the crackling
flames, she listened to the music and thought not for the first time
how much luckier she was than Louis XIV.  Louis may have been the Sun
King and all France may have trembled at his frown, but he couldn't
listen to Maria "XOas in his bath.  Nor could he survey the world from
'"40vteen thousand feet up in the air.  And Louis XIV had 7 to ver had
the chance to ski ... The doorbell shrilled.  Clare stood up, thinking,
If it's a Jehovah's Witness, I'll n'qream.  She opened the door.

"Sam!  What the hell dyou think you're doing here?"

"Let me inside and I'll tell you."  Sam was shivering.

"Miranda called me from the hospital."

"What's wrong with Miranda?"  .

"Everything's okay, but she crashed her plane."

"Was she badly hurt?  Where is she?  Who's looking after her?"

"Look, could I please come inside?"  Sam shivered again.

"She'll be out of the hospital soon.  I spoke to her this morning.  You
can call her yourself this afternoon.  I'm surprised you haven't heard
about her crash it even made the LA Times."

After a battery of anxious questions about her sister, Clare explained,
"I haven't seen a newspaper for nearly a month.  We got back yesterday
evening two days late because of an airport strike.  I haven't even
read my mail yet."  Clare stood aside ungraciously as Sam stepped into
the house; then she led the way to her living room.

"Where's Josh?"  Sam asked.

"You can't see him this evening," Clare said curtly.

"He's going to tea with a friend and then it's Cubs night."

"I can wait," Sam said, determined to be pleasant.

"You look terrific."  Coldly antagonistic, Clare glared at the man who
had cheated on her, and who, for almost four years, had refused her a
divorce, all the while providing no child support.

"How about some coffee?"  Sam suggested, warming his hands at the
fire.

"No coffee," Clare said.  She wondered what Sam had done to himself.
he looked years younger than the last time she'd seen him.

Noticing her surreptitious look, Sam grinned.

"Yes, I've taken myself in hand.  For my no-flour diet, deduct two
years; for no-more-vodka resolution, deduct four years; for exercise
bicycle, deduct four years; for new teeth, deduct two years; for smart
haircut, deduct one year; for well-cut pants and shirt, deduct two
years."

"I'm not interested," Clare said acidly.

"Say what you've come to say, and then get out."  Sam said, "You will
be interested."  Briefly he outlined Adam's treachery, Elinor's plight,
and the trust problem.

"Are you telling me that Gran has been in a nursing home for nearly a
year and my sisters didn't let me know?"

"Don't take it out on me, Clare.  I'm the one that's just flown halfway
around the world to do something about it."

"Where's Gran?  I must see her."

"There's a limo and a driver waiting outside to take you wherever you
want to go, but first I have to talk to you.  How long is it since you
saw Elinor?"  Clare said brusquely, "July 1965, at-Saracen."

"You mean you haven't seen Elinor for almost four year sT Sam was
astonished..

"I tried," Clare said uneasily.

"I wrote to Gran several times, but my letters were always answered by
Adam.  He said he was sorry to write formally but he had been
instructed by his client that she wished no communication to take place
... that sort of thing."

"I bet Elinor asked Adam to check you were okay.  I bet she wanted a
reunion.  And I bet Adam covered his ass nicely."

"His letters put my back up."

"They were meant to," Sam said.

"But how come Buzz didn't get in touch with you, behind Elinor's back
or in front of it?  : how ry lare ashamed, said, "Buzz did t .1 don't
know found out where I was, but she turned up one evening, after I'd
moved into my basement flat.  I'd had a tough day at the shoe shop one
woman took three hours to buy one pair of shoes.  Buzz started telling
me to be a good girl apologize to Gran.  I'm afraid I yelled at her and
told her fairly forcibly to go.  Then she tried to give me money she
hid in an envelope and that convinced me she was really coming from
Gran."

"And Buzz never tried to contact you aga in?"  Sam asked.

Clare answered reluctantly: "Yes ... She telephoned several times.  I'm
afraid that I ... I thought she was Gran's spy, you see?  Every time
she spoke to me, Buzz said I should think of Josh and not cut off my
nose to spite my face and ... I was determined not to slink back to you
with my tail between my legs, as you all thought I would.  I was
determined to show I could stand on my own feet and live my own life. I
wasn't a little girl to be pushed around."  She glared at Sam.

He sighed.

"Buzz always said you were as stubborn as Elinor..."

"If you've come here to Hastily Sam said, "Sorry!  But didn't Miranda
or Annabel contact you then?"  Clare hesitated, then admitted, "Yes,
they did but with amazing lack of tact!  Annabel was feeling sorry for
herself on the other side of the Atlantic.  And Miranda's face seemed
to grin out of every paper I picked up and everything she was doing was
exactly what I was trying not to do!"  Again she glared at Sam.

"I don't think you have any idea how difficult it was for me with no
employable skills to earn my own living and look after Josh."

"I promise we'll talk about that after I tell you why I'm here."  Sam
then outlined Miranda's plan to remove Elinor from the nursing home.
Persuasively he ended, "The nursing staff have never seen you, Clare,
and they've never seen me, and they can't refuse to let us in if we
turn up on the doorstep on an unexpected business trip to England with
our passports to prove who we are.  We're Elinor's blood relatives."
Clare said hesitantly, "Of course I want to See Gran as far as
possible, and I'll do anything to make her happy.  But ... have you any
proof of this wild story?  You said that Miranda has concussion.  Are
you sure she wasn't a bit delirious when she told you this?"  "Don't
forget Buzz," Sam reminded her.

"She was the first person to become suspicious of Adam and of the
nursing home, but nobody listened to her.  Call Buzz if you like she's
with Miranda."

After she telephoned Buzz, Clare's reticence immediately disappeared.
She said, "Eastbourne isn't far from here.  Buzz says the best time to
remove Gran is probably in the early afternoon, when there are visitors
around and the staff won't want to make a fuss.  Let's leave now."

CHAPTER 27

110"DAY, 28 JANUARY 1969

1.v, still worried Clare said, seated in the back of .  I if ly moving
rented Bentley.  She had changed from her ski clothes to a respectable
navy suit.

11 don't want to push you.  The final decision is yours and so is the
responsibility," Sam said firmly.

"She isn't my grandmother.  I know nothing about British medical law,
but I do know that possession is nine tenths of the law."  Clare stared
out at the snow-covered landscape.

"I never ought I'd miss her so much.  Before her illness, Gran was rock
of our family; she seemed so strong and always there to look after us.
After our ... manent disagreement ... there was a hole in my life. And
it will ver be filled.  I just know it."  Sam said, "Will, you stop
talking as if Elinor's dead?  ow it's your turn to look after her.
That's all."  Eventually the Bentley turned off the road and passed 33
tween snow-encrusted, elaborate black gates and up a ng drive.  Curvi
Sam glanced at the white columns of the mansion before him.  With a
note of doubt in his voice, he said, "This place ?"

doesn't look like a prison."  The mansion looked as immacur as a rich
child's doll's house.  On either side lately cared fo -capped yew
hedges; icicles of the building stood snow dripped from the branches of
old cedar trees; beyond them, white lawns sloped towards a dismal grey
smudge, the English Channel.

In the warm, walnut-panelled entrance hall, Sam felt increasingly
uneasy; he and Clare sat on a burgundy brocade sofa while the
sandy-hair cd receptionist went to fetch Matron Braddock.

Matron Braddock entered, wrapped in a navy uniform that made her appear
that much more formidable.  She did not mention that she had just tried
unsuccessfully to contact Mr.  Grant by telephone, but instead politely
asked Sam for proof of identity."  In her charming voice, she
explained, "We have to be careful.  Many journalists have tried to see
Mrs.  O'Dare.  You'd never believe the lies."

"Yes I would," Sam said, "I work in Hollywood ."  He produced two
passports from his pocket.

"We're glad the old lady is being well protected."  Having checked the
passports, the matron briefly informed the Shapiros of Elinor's
condition, but would give no prognosis or details of her treatment:
that could only be discussed with Mrs.  O'Dare's doctors.

Clare gasped when she saw her grandmother's gaunt, pale face;
white-haired, with eyes closed, Elinor lay motionless on the metal
hospital bed.

Clare ran forward and knelt by the bedside.

"Gran, Gran darling ... Can she hear meT.  She looked up at the
matron.

"She's sleeping," Matron Braddock said.

"Her after-lunch nap.

"We'll wait until she wakes up," Clare said decisively.

"She looks so frail," she added, fighting tears as she noticed, on the
bedside table, silver-framed photographs of Billy, Edward, and the
three sisters in their best party dresses at Starlings.

She turned to Sam.

"I expect you'll be more comfortable in Gran's sitting room next door,
darling, but I want to sit quietly with her."

"Can I offer you afternoon teaT the matron asked pleasantly.

"Do you have any coffee?"  Sam asked equally pleasantly, moved towards
the interconnecting door.

"And can ask my driver to bring my briefcase?"  He wanted
-cum-bodyguard, to see the layout of the the driver gprsing home.

O'Dare might be asleep for quite a long time," the Won warned Clare.
don't mind a long wait," Clare said sweetly as she Settled in the chair
opposite Elinor's bed; behind Clare, the glass doors of the French
window faced the snowy rdenJust before four o'clock, Matron Braddock
returned...:"I do hope Gran wakes soon," Clare said, "because we'll
j.ave to leave shortly.  Sam has to get back to our hotel to tAke his
LA business calls."

"I don't like to disturb Mrs.  O'Dare if it isn't necessary."

"Of course not," Clare reassured her.

"We can visit her again before we leave England."  When the coffee tray
was removed, Clare rapped on the sonnecting door, her signal to Sam. He
hurried to stand juard in the corridor, ready to loudly ask his way to
the John should anyone appear.

Clare gently tried to shake Elinor awake.  She did not respond.  Clare
shook harder.  Elinor made no movement.  Clare tried to pull her
upright into a sitting position.  Elinor's head flopped back, and her
arms dangled like a rag doll's.

Quickly Clare rearranged her grandmother, smoothed the bedclothes, and
went into the corridor.

"Gran's certainly not asleep," she whispered to Sam.

"She must be drugged."

"I told Steve to stretch his legs take a walk around the grounds while
it's still light enough to see," Sam said.  He looked at his watch.

"We'd better start before it gets dark."

He joined Clare in the bedroom and pressed Elinor's bedside bell.

When Matron Braddock reappeared, Clare bent over her silent grandmother
and kissed her forehead.  She and Sam then followed the matron from the
room.

As they moved slowly along the corridor towards the entrance hall, the
matron looked at Sam.

"You've forgotten your briefcase, haven't you?  I'll get it for you."

"So I have!  Stupid of me.  No trouble."  Sam turned and moved swiftly
back along the corridor.

He snatched up his briefcase and quickly locked both doors leading from
Elinor's suite to the corridor, shoving the keys in his pocket.  He
grabbed some pink blankets from the bureau in the bedroom, pulled aside
the high invalid's table on casters that stretched across the end of
Elinor's bed, then yanked back the brocade curtains.

Steve's pale face and pale blue eyes appeared outside.  Sam nodded.
Steve pulled up his coat collar, checked his leather driving gloves,
walked back ten paces, then charged the window, turning his left
shoulder towards it as he reached it.

With loud cracks like pistol shots, the doors caved inward.  Glass flew
everywhere, and a blast of icy air swept into the bedroom.  Steve
backed through the shattered doors into the room.

Sam heaved a pink armchair in front of the connecting door to the
sitting room and yanked the bedclothes from Elinor's bed.

Steve wrapped Elinor in a pink blanket, threw her over his shoulder in
a fireman's lift, and disappeared through the smashed doors into the
darkness.  He was followed closely by Sam, who couldn't see a thing and
didn't know where Steve had parked the car.

Panting, the two men ran through the snow.  Steve, th est to reach the
Bentley, yanked the back door open and."  "ropping the pink bundle on
the back seat, jumped in the driving seat and switched on the ignition
and lights.  Then he hit the horn three times in fast succession.

Sam threw himself into the back of the car and fell on top of the pink
bundle.  He leaned across and flung open c far door.  Clare should have
been running towards it.

But Clare was nowhere to be seen.  -Sam panted, "If we're held up,
Steve, you take off."  He jgn through the snow to the front steps of
the nursing it ome then slowed down to walk calmly through the entrance
doors.

In the middle of the hall, Clare was struggling with Matron Braddock.
Sam dodged past them, grabbed the screaming receptionist, and flung her
at a white-coated male orderly who was running towards the matron.  The
orderly tried to dodge the outflung arms of the receptionist, lost his
footing on the highly polished parquet, and fell to the floor.

Sam threw his right arm around the matron's neck and yanked it backward
to pull her away from Clare.  The siatron gasped and tried to twist her
body from Sam's grasp, but she did not let go of Clare.

The orderly scrambled to his feet, leapt forward, and kicked Sam in the
kidneys.  Sam jerked violently back, pulling the matron with him.  As
she fell, she released her grip on Clare.

"Get out fast, Clare!"  Sam roared.

As Clare scrambled up and ran in stockinged feet towards the glass
front door, the orderly raced after her, but she managed to escape.
Outside, however, Clare stumbled in the darkness and fell down the
stone steps beyond the front door.  The man caught up and threw himself
upon her.

In the hall, Matron Braddock had twisted so that she was on top of Sam,
who was now lying on his back.  Fighting like a man, she did her best
to gouge his eyes out.

Sam managed to pull his right fist back and smash it upward.  He felt
it strike bone, heard a grunt, and was suddenly able to see again. Half
crouched in pain, he staggered towards the front door.

Just beyond the stone steps, the man in the white coat was grappling
with Clare.  Sam jumped to the bottom of the steps, drew his foot back,
and kicked.  The man grunted and fell sideways on the snow.

"Get to the car!"  Sam yelled, thrusting his hand out to help her.

Together, they ran to the already moving Bentley.  Sam shoved Clare
into the back, then threw himself on top of her.  As they sorted
themselves out, the Bentley turned out of the main gates and picked up
speed.

"Darling Sam!"  Clare flung her arms around him.

The secretary of the Lord Willington Nursing Home did not know how to
contact someone on a cruise liner in the Caribbean.  She telephoned the
travel agent who had arranged Dr.  Craig-Dunlop's trip.  He advised her
to call the cruise liner's London office.

The agitated deputy matron fluttered around the telephone.  She said
again, "Tell them it's urgent!"

The secretary put her hand over the mouthpiece.

"It's not that easy, Sister Parks.  We have to contact the Antigone
through some radio station in Somerset the main shore to-ship station.
They say it'll take at least a few hours to reach the doctor."

"A few hours!"  Nurse Parks twittered.

The secretary explained, "The radio station has to request an emergency
appointment with the doctor, giving the callback frequency.  Once
that's been done, the doctor can speak to you from the ship's radio
room.  You'll just have to wait, Sister Parks."  ward VII HospiIt
department of the King Ed ca sua y Matron Braddock sat waiting for
treat Her left arm had been put in a sling to relieve the pressure; it
was painful and swelling fast; she couldn't move her fingers.  The
break was just above the wrist.

IThe matron's arm throbbed badly, but she decided not to ask for
painkillers.  She could take more pain than most people, and at the
moment, she needed a clear head.  As .0be waited for her arm to be
X-rayed, Ivy Braddock carefully considered her position and her
options.

What did she have to lose?  A great deal.  Mrs.  O'Dare had been
removed from the nursing home inl, what was clearly a carefully planned
operation.  Mr.  Shapiro did not seem the sort of man to let the matter
jut, especially since she had hit him: Matron Braddock remembered blood
streaming from his mouth.

If the police were called in, she might be arrested.  She 'might even
stand trial.  Whether or not she was convicted of helping to restrain a
patient for illegal purposes, after the resultant publicity she would
certainly never again be able to get another -good nursing job in
Britain.

The only thing that frightened the matron more than the prospect of
discussing Mrs.  O'Dare with the police was discussing her with Mr.
Grant.  Matron Braddock had sensed the violence and vengeance that were
part of Mr.  Grant's temperament.  Of course, he couldn't get any money
back from her, but she was frightened of his retribution, whatever it
might be.

The matron considered blackmailing Dr.  Craig-Dunlop.  She rejected
this idea only because the doctor was in a position to
counter-blackmail her.

There was really only one thing for Matron Ivy Braddock to do.

Back in, the comforting serenity of Applcbank Cottage, Clare sat
beside Sam in front of the fire and stared into the flames.  She hadn't
been able to contact Annabel, but Miranda and Buzz had been thrilled to
hear the news of Elinor's rescue.  It had been difficult to stop Buzz
from travelling over that night to look after her old friend.

Elinor was sleeping in the spare room; Steve, the driver, was staying
at the Bath Arms; and Sam who had insisted on sticking around said he'd
sleep on the living-room sofa.

Six-year-old Josh, too excited by the arrival of his father to be able
to sleep, kept coming down in his pyJamas to ask for a glass of water.
Every time he appeared, Clare felt the usual pangs of guilt.  Yet again
she worried whether Josh would prefer to live alone with a happy
mother, or with his father and an unhappy mother.

"Now that the fuss has died down," Sam said, "what happened to you?" 
"I didn't expect to hear that crash I suppose you broke the French
window. I panicked and started to run towards the front door.  That
damned matron tried to stop me.  I honestly can't remember much about
it.  I'm sorry I know I should have waited for the three toots."  Sam
grinned.

"If you'd just looked surprised, she'd have rushed to investigate and
then you could have simply walked out of the front door, as planned."

"Things didn't happen as planned."

"No," Sam said.  He paused for a moment before adding, "They almost
never do, do they?, Clare thought how strange it was that the animosity
between them had dissolved.  For nearly four years, she had bitterly
resented Sam's ability to thwart her and been resentful of his power.
She remembered Gilda, who had worked with her at the Chelsea shoe shop,
saying long ago, "Don't tell me you've fallen out of love with that
husband If you had, you'd be indifferent you wouldn't Aamn about him."
Sam watched the firelight flicker on Clare's small, 90at features, he
thought, This is the moment to give it my st try.  Aloud he said
softly, "I don't know how to say this .. I want to say I'm sorry I've
been such a bastard.  I reckoned if I didn't give you any money, and I
didn't let #6 u have any evidence, and I didn't let you divorce me, Aen
you'd come back to me."

"That's the way you train dogs, not wivesl" Clare said tartly.

"Okay" I was wrong.  I admit it."

"Thanks," Clare replied bitterly.  She added, "I've never understood
why you won't let me go.  What's the difference between me and your
other ex-wives?"

"Josh, for a start."

"I realize that no other man can replace a father not even a bad one,"
Clare said, still bitter.

"But that's not enough reason to return to you.  I have my life to
lead.  I am not merely Josh's mother."

"I never expected you to be able to manage on your own.  I really
admire you for that ... This bakery is a great idea.  You could build
it into a chain.  Even the name's right."  Clare had called her
business ABUNDANCE.

Clare said, "I've no intention of building it up into a chain.  That's
how a man would see a successful business!  I've looked into men's
territory and I didn't like what I saw.  I don't want the worry of a
big business.  I don't want that treadmill!  I just want to enjoy my
little business and do something useful while I earn my living."  She
pushed her dark hair out of her eyes and added, "I don't want the sort
of life that Miranda leads.  It was relatively easy for me to leave for
four weeks in Switzerland but I bet Miranda can't just drop everything
and go skiing."  Sam tried a new tack.

"I never realized how much I enjoyed being with you until you'd gone,
Clare.  And I miss Josh every single goddamn day."  Persuasively ne
continued, "Clare, won't you let me have one more chance?  Remember
that Josh is our son, not just yours."  He saw Clare wince and pressed
on what was clearly her Achilles" heel.

"Clare, we both should be deciding what's best for Josh."

"You forgot that Josh was your son when it came to paying the bills for
him!"  Clare cried.

"You didn't seem to care then what was best for Josh.  Don't talk to me
of reconciliation.  Our marriage clearly wasn't important to you!"

Sam looked into her eyes.

"I promise you, Clare, that our marriage is important to me.  Would I
have dropped everything and flown halfway around the world to rescue
your grandmother if that weren't the ca seT "I'm grateful.  But not
that grateful," Clare said.  Briefly she remembered.

"You had your squalid little adventures, Sam.  You thought that what I
didn't know wouldn't hurt me.  Well, it didn't hurt me, but I told you
before it hurt our marriage.  Instead of protecting the ship we were
building, you deliberately Screwed holes in it and then looked
surprised when it leaked."

"But it hasn't sunk."

"You've been trying to get me into bed ever since we got back here.  I
remember your tactics.  But if you and I made love, it would legally
wipe out the last three and a half years.  In ten minutes, we would be
legally reconciled, so if it didn't work, I'd have to start all over
again and, incidentally, the lawyer's bills would start again.  So I
can't risk it, even if I wanted to, which I don't.  I'm in love with
another man!"  Clare thought she might as well let him have it between
the eyes.

"I now have a very happy, steady relationship with a thoughtful,
gentle, concerned lover."  Sam said, "And would this thoughtful,
gentle, concerned of yours have had the guts to smash jaws for your
other?"  kt seven the next morning, when it was still dark, Josh rcpt
into bed beside Clare and said, "I fink she's woken Clare leapt out of
bed and listened outside the spare door  She heard weak sobbing, She
entered and '4wtched on the fight.  Elinor turned towards the door, her
thin fingers clutching .-the sheet.

"Clare," she whispered in surprise.

"Where am I?  HOW wonderful to see you, dear child."  .. Clare knelt by
the bedside, took the frail blue-veined hands in hers, and kissed
them.

"You're safe now, darling.

"MIS is where I live.  You're never going back to that dreadful place
again.  Buzz is-coming to help me look after you."

"Clare, I've missed you so much."

"And I've missed you.  I've been stupid and stubborn."

"So have I'm so sorry, darling Gran.  Will you forgive me?"  "If you
forgive me."

"Let's not waste any more time, not one more day."

"Not one more day," whispered Elinor as Clare bent to hug her.

Almost weeping, Clare felt she had to explain.

"Darling, if you'd answered any of my letters, I would have come
rushing to you.  I wrote you sad letters, angry letters, and
self-pitying letters.  But Adam made it clear that you would only see
me after I had made a formal apology.  I felt more hurt each time he
told me."  Elinor whispered, "I wish I'd known.  I missed you so.  And
I missed Josh."  Clare felt remorseful.  Elinor had missed three and a
half years of the life of her only great-grandchild, who looked so like
Daddy Billy's boyhood photos.

Elinor stroked Clare's hair.

"But none of it matters now, All that matters is that we're together
again."

At ten o'clock, the doctor left Elinor, after prescribing a low dosage
of Valium during the next few days while she was weaned from her
medication and detoxified.

Just after his departure, Clare answered insistent rings at the front
door.  Miranda stood on the doorstep, her head still bandaged.  Behind
her was Buzz.

Speechless, Clare held out her arms to her sister: they hugged in
silence.

"How's Nell?"  Buzz asked urgently.

"She's going to be fine, especially now that you're both here," Clare
said.

After a happy, tearful reunion at Elinor's bedside, they left her to
rest.

As the three women drank coffee in the kitchen, Miranda looked
puzzled.

"Clare darling, I never understood why you were broke.  Adam told us
you were getting an income from the trust, but that you wouldn't see
Gran, and wanted nothing to do with Annabel or me because we sided with
Gran."

"Adam told me that you and Annabel didn't want to see me," Clare
said.

"And I didn't get a penny from the trust my allowance stopped as soon
as I left Saracen."  Briefly Miranda wondered how she could ever have
allowed herself to care for Adam.  She said, "We've got to nail him,
fast."

"Sam's on the phone discussing it with some London lawyers."

"I wish I could be more help," Miranda said.

"But I'm still getting bad headaches and it's hard for me to
concentrate.  I'm also having trouble with my memory I can't remember a
thing about my crash."  Hearing a car draw up outside, Clare glanced
casually #e: pots of geraniums on the window ledge.

"What's a a taxi doing he re?"  Jm peered out of the window.

"Cor, I do believe that's Annabel.

-No, it can't be," Clare said.

"Goodness ... what a wondedW coincidence!"

Miranda darted to the kitchen window and, as Clare ran JW the passage
to the front door, called angrily to her, Wpu can't expect me to
believe this is a coincidence!  How AWe you arrange this!" -Bewildered,
Clare turned and said, "What's the matter?  I haven't seen Frog for
almost four years!  I haven't arranged 4ny thing

"Oh, no?  Do you expect me to believe that on the first time I see you
in over three years, Annabel just happens to 6ow up?  How dare you try
to fix up this clumsy reconciliation behind my back."

"Oh do shut up, Miranda.  I haven't a clue what you're ng about.  What
is your probleinT Clare asked crossly.  arc you still feeling the
effects of your accident?"  "Not at all," Miranda said angrily.

"And if you open that or to her, I swear I'm leaving!"

"Stop that!  You've always had a flair for dramatics, but s is not the
time," Clare said.

"Look, I don't know what's ppened between the two of you, but you'll
just have to sort it out fast.  This is too important."  She moved
forward and opened the front door.

Standing on the doorstep, Annabel burst into tears.

"Oh Clare, you are here!  I was afraid I nidght have been given an old
address.  It's so good to see you again!  I've missed you so!"

"Come inside quickly, darling!"  Clare shivered against the cold as she
tugged Annabel, babbling happily, along the passage and into the warm
kitchen.

Annabel abruptly stopped chattering when she saw Miranda.

Miranda glared.

"I don't know how you have the gall to show your face here!"

Annabel sobbed, "Oh, Miranda, you don't know what's happened ... Adam
didn't love me..."

"Oh, I knew that," Miranda said stonily.

"He didn't love either of us..  ."

"What are you talking about?"  Clare asked.

Miranda said, "Adam's been having a love affair with me for several
years, and with both me and Annabel for several months."

"Both of you?"  Clare looked astonished.

"Adam!  I can't believe it!"

"It's worse than that," Annabel sobbed.

"Adam likes boys, too!"

The other three women were stunned into silence.  Buzz raised her arms
in a perplexed gesture.

Then Miranda said contemptuously, "Annabel, you must be out of your
mind!"

"No, believe me.  I didn't want to accept it either, so I went to a pub
where homosexuals hang out.  I was told Adam would be there, and he
was.  I wish'..  . I've tried ... to pretend to myself that I imagined
it.  But I know I didn "

"t.  Roger told me Adam's always been like that so if you don't believe
me, ask him."

"Roger who?"  Miranda snapped.

"Sonia's nephew.  The Roger who taught us all the twist," Annabel
said.

Miranda was scornful.

"Everyone in London knows that Roger's that way.  Plenty of men are.  I
know some of my friends are but not Adam."

"Yes he is!"  Annabel insisted, and again started to cry.

"I know how you feel because I know how I felt.  And there was nobody I
could talk to about it nobody I could really trust, who could explain
what was going on.  I felt so lonely."  5o6 r," Clare decided.

"Do you Ogoing to phone Roge num berT nodded.  Buzz hurried over and
hugged her.  my poor lamb."

"Clare returned to a silent kitchen.  A tearful Annabel sat kitchen
table, staring.  From the other side, Miranda jeowled suspiciously at
Annabel.  ""Roger says it's true."  Clare spoke quietly.

"And I believe n. He and Adam had ... well ... a fling some time tjck.
He said he wasn't Adam's first either."  Miranda burst into tears.
Clare said gently.

"Annabel, why don't you telephone Scott?"

All the misery she felt was in Annabel's expressive eyes.

3 can't ... I feel ... too much of a fool."  She started to weep
again.

"I said terrible things to Scott ... I've made iuch a fool of myself."
Miranda lifted her head and painfully admitted, "I think ve both made
fools of ourselves.  But don't be too proud admit to Scott that you
lost your head over a man who esn't give a damn about you.  I know
Scott still loves u. Phone him."  Annabel hesitated, then nodded.

"All right, I will.  But it's five in the morning in New York."

"I should wait a bit, until you're feeling calmer," Clare suggested.

Humbly Annabel said, "Thank you for saying that, Miranda."  But she
knew she had to say more than that, to start to repair the wound she
had slashed in her relationship with Miranda.  She knew what she ought
to say but she hesitated.  Then Annabel forced herself to say the two
words that have, in their time, undoubtedly altered history and the
destiny of the human race two simple words that those who wish to hear
them find so easy to expect yet those who wish to say them find so
difficult to deliver.  Slowly and painfully Annabel said, "I'm sorry,
Miranda."  Miranda hesitated, then said, "Thank you.  I'm sorry too.
Now let's forget it.  We've all been hurt by Adam."

"I think we all need a strong cup of tea," Buzz suggested, "before we
start repairing the damage Adam's caused.  That man had you three
exactly where he wanted youP

As Buzz put the kettle on, Clare said, puzzled, "What I don't
understand is why Adam should want to cut me off from my family."

"I think I know," Miranda said.

"I also know why he put Gran in that vile place.  Adam has been
siphoning money away from the trust, using some method that's legal;
this has probably taken longer than a straightforward theft.  If so, it
would explain why Adam separated us and encouraged us to quarrel.  He
did it to distract us while he quietly embezzled our money."

"What?  But I don't understand if he's stealing the money, why were we
sent those huge cheque sT Annabel asked.

"What we had was a drop in the ocean, compared to the total," Miranda
said.

"And while Adam was so kindly arranging for us to have as much money as
we wanted, it never occurred to us that he was stealing the rest."

The three sisters looked sadly at each other in silence: all felt
cheated, humiliated, and angry.

"I feel such a fool," Annabel said quietly.

Clare nodded.

"Me too."

"You aren't alone," Miranda said wryly.

"I could kick myself when I remember the acres of print I've read about
my hotshot business brain.  How could I have been so gullible for so
long?"  She did not complicate the situation by adding that Adam was
fighting her for control of her business.  I'd better telephone the
Bath Arms," Clare said.

"We one spare room and Gran's sleeping in it.  Sam's the sitting-room
sofa."

"s Josh?"  Miranda asked, suddenly rememberwhere"At school," Clare
said. She hoped that her son had not rotruen his aunts.."imnda said,
"Does Josh like being in the country?  You a lot less anxious, more
relaxed." .-Yes, Josh loves it.  And I'm happy with my life."

"Ve can see you are," Annabel said wistfully.  0,you look much better,
Annabel," Clare said quickly.  When y our face was thinner, it looked
elegant, but ... pu look far prettier now."  Wranda nodded.

"Clare's right.  Sickening to see you look so ravishing without one
spot of make-up!"

Annabel wrinkled her tiny nose and said in a pleased Voice, "Do you
really think soT When her sisters had taken their baggage to the local
inn, .-i Clare told Sam what they had discussed.

"Don't kick yourself too hard," Sam said.

"It sounds as if Adam is an experienced con man, and like all of them,
he knows how to flatter women and gain their confidence.  i'The
bastard's good-looking, charming, sophisticated, and self-assured.  He
zeroed in on each of your vulnerable areas; he pressed the buttons of
your insecurities; he had you all running around in circles, doing
exactly what he wanted.  Now you must stop reacting and start acting.
Now we have to strike back."  Clare said, "Adam doesn't know he's been
rumbled.  We'd better let him think that we're still quarrelling with
each other."

"Our weak point there is Annabel.  Where does Adam think she's been for
the last few days?"

"I've no idea.  Ask her."  5o8 Later, Annabel explained.  11 couldn't
face Adam.or speak to him ... after I saw him with that boy.  So I
wrote a note, said I was coming down with flu and didn't want him to
catch it, and was going to a health farm for a week of course, no
health farm would have let me in with flu, but it was the first lie
that jumped into my mind.  In fact, I stayed at the Park Lane and sat
in my bedroom shaking and crying, until I thought to phone Sam's
secretary to get Clare's address."

At six o'clock that evening, Clare went to deliver a fresh loaf of
bread to a woman in bed with arthritis.  She refused Sam's offer to
drive her, saying that it was only a short trip and she wanted some
fresh air.  While she was away, Sam could put Josh to bed.

Josh, who at six considered himself too old to be bathed by his mother,
was thrilled to let Sam bathe him.

When the cork floor of the bathroom was awash with water, Sam, in his
shirtsleeves, went down to the kitchen for a mop.  As a key turned in
the front door, he called out, "Clare?  I've managed to get Josh into,
the bath, but it's not so easy to get him out."  Hearing an
unexpectedly heavy tread, Sam looked up just as the best-looking man he
had ever seen stooped to avoid the lintel over the kitchen door.

"Where's ClareT David asked casually.

"My wife is out," Sam said equally casually.  Clare hadn't mentioned
that this son of a bitch looked like the hero of a spaghetti western.

The two men stared at each other in silence, like dogs, stiff-legged,
sniffing each other before a fight.

So this was why Clare hadn't phoned him as usual yesterday evening,
David thought.  When he'd rung her, the line had always been engaged.
The big man with dark curly hair and his shirtsleeves rolled up over
muscular arms was more of a charmer than David had expected.  He was
friendly, easy to talk to.

If you're David, why don't you get the hell out of he re?"  Sam said,
making the situation clear.  He added, "If you want to see my wife,
come back another day.  There's a lot going on here."  Sam knew that,
without Romeo hanging around, he could operate much more effectively on
Clare.

1940 d better get the bastard out before she returned.

""As I came to see Clare, I'll wait till she gets back."  JUVid had
phoned late that afternoon to find out why he hadn't heard from Clare;
Josh answered and, totally overexcited by the presence of so many
relatives, explained that his daddy had arrived.  David had come to see
what was going on.

Sam said, "Clare and I have a lot to talk about.  You're in the way."
He took an aggressive step towards David, who did not retreat.

"I'll wait for Clare," David repeated.

"If Clare wants me o leave, then she can say so."

They both heard Josh yell from the bathroom, "Dad, where's the mop!"

"I'll be up in a minute, son," Sam yelled back.  To David he said, "I
want you out of here, now!, From the darkness outside, both men heard
the garden gate wheeze open and the asthmatic twang of a bicycle
bell.

Whistling, Clare opened the back door to the kitchen to find Sam and
David now staring at each other with the alert, focused, intent
expression of two wrestlers about to pounce.

"David!  What's happened.?"

Clare exclaimed.

"Nothing yet," Sam said, not taking his eyes off David.

"Why didn't you tell me he was coming?"  said David without taking his
eyes off Sam.

"Because it's none of your god daran business!"  Sam roared.

"Because I didn't expect him," Clare said.

"I tried to ring you this morning, but you were out."

"Does this guy have to stay?"  Sam asked.

"Do you want me to go, ClareT David asked, equally truculent.

"Stop it, both of you!"  Clare ordered.

"You're behaving like five-year-olds."

"Get the hell out of here," Sam growled to David.

"You're in the way.  There's no reason for you to stay."

"Yes there is.  I want to marry Clare," David said.

"You've never once said So!"  Clare cried.

"Clare happens to be married already."  Sam glared.

Josh appeared, naked and dripping, in the doorway from the hall.  He
took no notice of David or Clare but, hero worship imprinted on his
face, ran straight to Sam, who swung him up in his arms and hugged
him.

"You haven't finished my barf."  Josh gave Sam a sloppy kiss.

"Well, will you?"  David asked Clare.

"Marry me, I meanT Hesitantly Clare looked from one man to the other.

CHAPTER 28

THURSDAY, 30 JANUARY 1969

After a restless night, Elinor woke early.  Buzz made her a cup of tea
and provided a cheerful stream of gossip about her cruise with Bertha
Higby.

Then Elinor asked how things were at Saracen.  Buzz hesitated.  Elinor
whispered, "What's happened?"  Eventually Buzz said, "That Adam, he
sold it."

"Sold my home?"

"Someone had to tell you sometime, Nell."  Elinor said nothing, but two
tears rolled down her cheeks.  Finally she whispered, "What's happened
to the sta ffT "Oh, they were well looked after, that I will say!  I
don't know what's happened to 'em all, because I ain't been back
yet."

"At least we're all together again," Elinor murmured.

"That's the most important thing."  Buzz comforted her for the next two
hours, answering Elinor's halting questions about events of the past
year.  When it was nearly time for Clare to appear with the breakfast
tray, Elinor dried her eyes and tried to look cheerful.

When a smiling Clare arrived, she said, "Annabel and Miranda have gone
to London for the day, on business."

"Is it about Adam?"

"Yes."

"He's stolen my money, hasn't he?"  "Don't you tell her no lies," Buzz
said.

Hesitantly Clare replied, "It might not all have gone.  We don't know
yet.  But even if it has disappeared, you'll still have an income from
future book sales."  if I get any of the money back, I want it divided
equally between the five of us," Elinor said weakly.

"I should have done that in the-first place."

At about the same time, Dr.  Craig-Dunlop, wearing a Paisley silk
dressing gown and pyjamas, left the stateroom and reported to the radio
room, where he -was shown how to use the receiver.

The little doctor's black-fringed eyes widened as he listened to the
faint but agitated voice of Sister Parks, his deputy matron.

"Calm down, Sister Parks," he said when he could get a word in.

"If I understand correctly, some relatives of Mrs.  O'Dare have removed
her from the nursing home, but you do not know whether or not this was
with her consent.  It 's certainly without our consent, and we
therefore cannot be responsible for what happens to Mrs.  O'Dare.  That
is our official attitude, Sister Parks."  His calm, firm voice
obviously reassured her, for she seemed less agitated.

"Has Mr.  Grant been informed?  No?  Splendid!  As Mrs.  O'Dare has
been removed by her own relatives, who produced proof of their identity
before they did so, I can see no reason to inform Mr.  Grant until I
return ... Yes, naturally I'll come back straight away."  He thought
swiftly.  The cruise ship was due to arrive in Jamaica on Friday
afternoon, in some thirty hours.  God knows how long it would take him
to get back to England from Kingston.  He might have to hang around
until he could get a seat on a plane to New York.  There he might have
a further long wait: Rights to London didn't leave every five minutes.
He said, "I'll get back as soon as I can, Sister Parks, but my arrival
depends on connections and vail ability of seats.  I won't be there for
at least two days Probably longer.  I suspect the earliest you'll see
me is Sunday evening ... Yes, the second of February."  When Sister
Parks had brought him fully up to date, the doctor concluded, "As for
Matron Braddock, she did the most extraordinary thing.  Completely
cleared out her room, went off in a taxi, without a word to anyone, and
she left with a broken arm.  Perhaps Matron Braddock also had slight
concussion after her unfortunate fall.  Perhaps officially we had
better say that Matron is taking a long overdue holiday and that we
expect her return at the end of the month.  There is no need to say
more than that to anyone."  He gave a little cough.

"Because of Mrs.  O'Dare's not or-'icty, you may hear from newspaper
snoopers.  Do not speak to strangers, Sister Parks.  Tell Patricia to
be very careful when she answers my telephone.  Give no information to
anyone about Mrs.  O'Dare, except for my lawyer.  I think it wise to
inform him of this exasperating incident as soon as possible, and I'd
appreciate it if you would give him the details.  Now Fwant to speak to
Orderly Gibson ... Wen,get him!"  The doctor started to bite his left
thumbnail.

After an aggrieved speech from the orderly, the doctor "placated him.

"What impudence!  It sounds as if you were unduly provoked, Gibson.  We
will consult my lawyer as soon as I return, regarding assault and libel
and slander ... Yes, I promise you.  In the meantime, I don't think
you' should go to the police, or speak to anyone else.  After all, we
mustn't libel or slander anyone.  I know that I can rely on your
support in this highly embarrassing situation.  Do you agree?"

There was silence at the other end of the radiophone.

"I'll make it worth your while," the doctor said wearily.  Silence.

"You'll have a job for life, Gibson."

"Can I have that in writing?"  asked the white-coated orderly.

Like many of the legal offices in Lincoln's Inn, that of William Owen,
financial specialist lawyer, looked like an overworked headmaster's
study.  The lawyer sat behind a desk piled high with papers and red box
files.  He was a bulky man with sallow skin and frizzy grey hair.  Next
to him sat his consultant accountant, Richard Fraser, who specialized
in fraud; he had the pink cheeks and solemn young face of a
well-scrubbed choirboy.

Sitting opposite the desk between Annabel and Sam, Miranda felt very
tired; her head ached.

Mr.  Owen said, "From what you tell me, there are three distinct areas
of complaint.  Firstly, the seemingly unnecessary detention of your
grandmother in the nursing home.  Secondly, the possible embezzlement
of monies from the trust."  Thirdly, the possible purchase of SUPPLY
KITS shares by persons at present unknown, upon Adam Grant's
instructions, with money that may not rightfully belong to the
purchaser but to the Dove Trust."  "Can our grandmother sue the nursing
ho meT Annabel asked.

Mr.  Owen lifted his eyebrows and peered over his spectacles.  He did
not look optimistic.

"Even before I know the full facts, I can tell you that it might take
ten years of arduous legal work to be able to reclaim a relatively
small amount of money.  I probably won't advise such a waste of time
and energy."

"What about any embezzlement from the trust?"  Miranda asked.

"Surely the trustees must account for all funds?"  Annabel added.

Miranda shook her head.

"STG warned me that Adam and Paul Littlejohn are probably acting within
the law and, if that's so, nobody has any power legally to query e
actions of the trust."

"But why doesn't Adam have to answer our question sT Annabel said.

"He organized the trust."

"If Adam Grant is unwilling to give you information," Mr.  Owen
replied, "you may, as trust beneficiaries, decide to go to court to
seek information about the trust.  But to force the information from
him through the courts would take a long time."  Richard Fraser leaned
forward.

"From what you say, it sounds as if this operation was carefully
planned, years ago.  If so, the money will be accounted for on paper by
scurrilous documentation investments in companies that fail or shares
that drop like stones.  We'll be able to trace where each sum went when
it left the Dove Trust bank accounts.  But if fraud is involved, that
cash will have quickly been transferred again to numbered Swiss bank
accounts that are untraceable."  William Owen looked over his
half-glasses.

"Adam Grant is probably the only person who knows where that money is.
Undoubtedly, he keeps some written record of what's happening to it
because nobody can keep track of vast sums of money and complicated
bank transfers without some record.  But I expect his summary is
carefully hidden.  He probably keeps it in a small unobtrusive notebook
something that he could either carry around with him or leave in a
small safe.  If you could get your hands on it, then we could go to the
police but it's no use going to them without such evidence.  Though I
do advise you to contact the authorities now, so that they can act
immediately should you find any hard evidence."

"Then all we have to do is find that summary?"  Annabel asked.

Miranda snapped, "Adam's hardly likely to hand it to us on a plate."

Richard Fraser took the two sisters and Sam to a modern building near
Victoria the fraud squad base where he introduced them to Detective
Inspector Walter Piper; in a navy pin-striped suit and expensive pale
blue shirt, he looked more like a young trainee banker than a
policeman.  He took notes as Miranda told her story.  When she had
finished, the inspector said, "From what you say, and adding a few
guesses based on my experience, we're looking at this sort of
situation."  Carefully he summarized, "In July 1965, STG set up an
offshore Bermuda trust, administered by their associate accountants in
Bermuda.  The protector of the trust was Paul Littlejohn, a partner of
STG.  At the same time, Elinor O'Dare signed a general power of
attorney in favour of Adam Grant of STG, to be used in event of her
illness.

"Unlike Paul Littlejohn, a South African subject living in Bermuda,
Grant was based in Britain, subject to British law.  So in August 1966,
he persuaded Mrs.  O'Dare to substitute Paul Littlejohn for himself in
the power of attorney held by Grant.  Probably a clause in the transfer
deed stated that the power of attorney was subject to the law of
Bermuda and not British law.

"Mrs.  O'Dare also signed papers absolving Adam Grant and STG from any
further responsibility for Mrs.  O'Dare's affairs.

"In March 1967, Grant left STG to start his own firm.  Elinor O'Dare
transferred her business from STG to Grant's new office.  In February
1968, Paul Littlejohn who is probably Grant's accomplice left STG to
set up his own firm in Bermuda, to which he transferred the Dove Trust.
As the protector, Littlejohn had the power to remove existing trustees
and appoint other trustees.

"By February 1968, Mrs.  O'Dare had started treatment for paranoia in
the Lord Willington Nursing Home.  Paul Littlejohn was therefore able
to use his power of attorney t',.strip her of her personal fortune,
including a chfiteau in .  o f4ance.  At this point, those two villains
would have been able simply to siphon off all funds.  Paul Littlejohn
controlled the Dove Trust, as well as Mrs.  O'Dare's personal fortune,
but Adam Grant probably controlled Littlejohn.

"It also appears that Adam Grant, a director of S UPPLYKITS, has
acquired control of forty-six per cent of the shares of that company,
possibly using funds from the Dove Trust.  We'll be able to trace back
the recent purchases, and if they were paid for with money from the
Dove Trust, then those shares rightly belong to the trust.  If other
trust money has disappeared, then the trust might also claim the shares
that rightly belong to Grant."  When Inspector Piper was finished,
Miranda asked, "Where do we start?"  "Contact Mrs.  O'Dare's literary
agent, to ensure that no further royalties are forwarded to the Dove
Trust until it has been investigated.  You can't do anything else until
you have proof of illegality."

"Can we prosecute?"  "You can't prosecute unless you find some hard
evidence, because in 1966, when your grandmother signed the trust
deeds, she also signed papers saying that she no longer wished Adam
Grant or STG to handle her affairs and absolved both parties from any
future responsibility for her affairs.  She also voluntarily signed her
application to enter his nursing home.  So where's the crinieT The
inspector shrugged his shoulders.

"But I'll check our records to see whether Mr.  Grant has done anything
like this before."  Sam asked, "What do we do if we get hard pro ofT
"Bring it to us as fast as possible there always someone available to
take emergency action."  In her pale grey drawing room, Miranda
collapsed into an armchair.  She was exhausted; she also felt that the
white dagger slicing through her head was about to split it in two.

"Help yourselves."  She wearily waved her hand towards the drinks
tray.

"I've been trying to think.  I've no idea where Adam might keep a small
notebook.  It could be anywhere."  Sam poured himself a generous
whisky.

"Not "anywhere" because it's very valuable.  Where would you hide a
twenty carat blue-white marquise diamond?  Not anywhere."

"I doubt he carries it around with him," Miranda mused.

"What happens if he takes off his jacket and the notebook falls out?
... It wouldn't be safe from pickpockets.  it wouldn't be safe while he
... slept."

Annabel volunteered, "Sometimes I fetched things from Adam's pockets
cigarettes, keys, that sort of thing.  He'd never have asked me to do
such a thing if he kept something secret and precious in his
pockets."

"Do you think it might be in a bank vault?"  Miranda asked Sam.

"Unlikely," Sam said.

"It sounds as if Adam has to keep it handy to make entries."

"He's unlikely to keep it in his SUPPLY KITS office."  Miranda
continued to think aloud.

"We have the usual petty theft problems, so none of the staff arc
supposed to keep valuables in their desks."

"Maybe he keeps the notebook in an office safe?"  Sam asked.

"No, our only safe is in the accountant's office," Miranda said.

"And we regard it as a serious burglary risk.  We use it as little as
possible."

"Adam has his own safe in his apartment," Annabel volunteered.

"It's not particularly secret.  It's built into the window wall in his
sitting room, and it's hidden by a curtain ... Oh my God, I gave him my
jewellery to keep safe, and it's still there!"

"..Airanda smiled grimly.

"Maybe.  I've also seen that safe.

Adam keeps cash in it but not very much and a few valuable bits and
pieces: his father's gold cigarette case, things like that.  Last
Christmas I gave him a Cartier watch which he put in that safe.  I
noticed he never wore it: he always wears that old Omega."

"Maybe the notebook is hidden in his home but not in his safe," Sam
said.

"It's probably in a private sort of room his bedroom or bathroom.  And
it's probably in something immovable rather than something like a
briefcase that can be stolen."

Annabel said, "I think I know where it is."  Miranda and Sam looked at
her.

"No, really.  A couple of weeks ago, when Adam left for work, I was
still in bed, doing the newspaper crossword.  I wanted an eraser I'm
not very good at crosswords so I went to that Georgian desk opposite
the fireplace.  As I pulled the desk flap down, Adam opened the bedroom
door he'd forgotten something.  He made a lot of fuss about my going to
his desk.  But where would you look for an eraser if not in a desk?  I
wasn't rifling through the drawers, you understand."

"This notebook, or file, wouldn't be lying around in a. drawer," Sam
said.

"How about a secret drawer?"  Annabel suggested.

Miranda nodded.

"Any good eighteenth-century desk has at least one secret drawer,
because they didn't have wall safes then."

"D'you remember Gran showing us how to measure the depth of each desk
drawer with a ruler?  Any drawer that's shorter than the desk space it
seems to occupy probably has a secret compartment behind it."

"There are probably plenty of other hiding places in his bedroom," Sam
said.

"How can we get in the re?"  Miranda said, "You mean .. ."

"Can we break into the house?"  Sam asked impatiently.

"What staff are there?  What burglary precaution sT "His apartment's on
the top two floors of an old house in Cadogan Place," Miranda said.

"There are double locks and chains on the front door, sliding steel
shutters on the windows.  There might be some sort of access to the
roof, but I bet it's barred."  In a quiet voice, Annabel said, "There's
no need to break in.  I still have the keys.  Adam thinks I'm at a
health farm.  As far as he is concerned, our relationship hasn't
altered."

"The Trojan Horse!"  Sam exclaimed, delighted.

"When would be the best time for you to get in when you can be sure
that Adam won't be the re?"  "That's easy, "Miranda said triumphantly.
"The SUPPLY KITS EGM takes place tomorrow, at nine a.m."  at the
Connaught Rooms miles away from Cadogan Place.  Adam can't afford to
miss that meeting.  He has a starring role."

CHAPTER 29

TRID FRIDAYI 31 JANUARY 1969

s Maclayne turned up the collar of his heavy city 'ercoat and hurried
down the steps from the VCio, an bo ... ur late.  London was almost as
cold as New York, he thought, stifling a yawn..  Although eight a.m. in
London, it was still only three a.m. New York time.  Angus, unable to
sleep in the plane, had gone over his notes of the international
banking conference that had taken him to New York.

He crunched wearily through the gritty snow to the airport bus, which
smelled of stale cigarette smoke.  Although he carried only hand
baggage to avoid delay, there were too few customs officers, so it was
eight forty-five when he hurried to his black Daimler, waiting for him
at the terminal entrance: there was still enough time to get to the
meeting.

The voice of Maria Callas "In mia man" affin" tu sci' throbbed with
exultant emotion in Clare's pink kitchen.  David, who had eaten little,
pushed away his breakfast plate and said, "I wish you'd sit down and
talk about this seriously, Clare."

"If people bother to bicycle through the snow for my bread," Clare
said, tying her baker's apron, "I'm going to serve them as usual."

"But your damned husband will turn up tonight!  I want an answer from
you before then!"

Clare looked lovingly at him, but there was also determination in her
look.  Quietly she said, "I may be able to answer you tonight, but I
may not.  We've been together now for two years, sharing meals, hopes,
concerns; sharing my son, sharing my bed.  All that time I've loved you
even when you were in one of your "difficult" moods, when you didn't
want me or anyone else.  I have loved you, and you have known it, the
whole time.  And I've known that you loved me as well, even when it
didn't seem that way."

"Then why won't you say you'll marry meT "Because all the time we've
been together, I've never felt that you were really mine; you've been
like some partly domesticated animal there beside me for months, and
then one day gone!  Back to the wilds, or to whatever place your demons
drive you ... But now you're afraid of losing me, and you don't want
that, and I'm very glad.  I don't want you to lose me.  Nevertheless, I
can't accept your ultimatum: there are too many things to be
considered.  You, and our love for each other, are incredibly important
to me, but in the time I've had to wait for you to decide what you want
to do, I've grown stronger, more sure of myself, increasingly aware of
my absolute need to decide for myself what's best for me.  I need time
to make that decision.  I can't decide by this evening."

"Fine.  How long do you ne ed?"  "I don't know.  I may decide by
tomorrow, but I may need longer.  I might need a week, I might need
much longer than that.  But I think this is as important as you do and
that's why I'm not going to be rushed into a decision.  I hope you'll
allow me the time I need, and not put me under pressure.  And also I
hope you know that I really do love you, David."

"How can I believe that, when you won't say yes?"  "You know I love
being with you, David; I love doing things with you; I love learning
from you.  And I simply love sleeping with you."  A dreamy look came
into her eyes, -V'Ac hugged herself.

"I can't imagine anything more luxnuggling with you under the patchwork
quilt than s stairs, knowing that it's snowing outside.  Except waking
up in the middle of the night and putting my arm out to you and feeling
that wonderful warm lump beside me."

"So how are you going to feel if you wake up and the warm lump beside
you turns out to be Sam?  You have to decide whether you want me or a
square-jawed Superman gets his way with his fists."  Clare hesitated.
At Elinor's rescue, she had secretly found Sam's fight-now-talk-later,
he-man side almost irresistible.  Now, being fought over by two men
made her feel Eke a medieval damsel with white hands and a wimple.  To
Clare's surprise and chagrin, two aggressive, battling rivals for her
hand made her feel exultant and powerful, sneakily, guiltily thrilled
to bits.

Turning away from the oven, she looked intently at David and said,
"We're not the only ones concerned."

"Josh likes me you know he does and I'm growing very fond of him,"
David said.

"As a matter of fact, I was quite hurt when he" "Ran to his dad?  Josh
ignored me as well," Clare said ruefully.

"Whether or not I think his father deserves it, Josh loves his father.
And I'm glad he's loyal to his father painful though it is."

"So Josh is going to decide who you'll spend the rest of your life
with?"  David asked.

"What will happen to you in twelve years" time when Josh leaves you
with never a backward look to play in some college band or work his way
to India with the rest of his mates?  How are you going to feel then
when you wake up in the dark and feel for the warm lump?"  Clare sat
down abruptly.  This is what made her decision so difficult.  Where did
her duty lie?  With Josh.  And where did her heart lie?  With David. 
But suppose she went back to Sam and it didn't work out?  Briefly she
recalled what her life had been before David appeared.

No, she preferred not to think of it!  Life was never, never, never
going to be like that again for her.  She wasn't going to drop the
reins of her own life again.  Clare was damned if she was going to be
over influenced by Sam, David, or anyone.

Anyway she told herself, she didn't believe that Sam was going to turn
over a new leaf.

But if that wasn't his intention, then why had he bothered to come
here?  Sam had travelled halfway around the world no doubt at great
inconvenience, for Clare knew how carefully his life was structured to
help solve her family problems and to see her.  It certainly looked as
if he was serious.

Feeling ambivalent and confused, Clare said, "It's no use.  The
arguments just go round and round in my mind, until I'm back where I
started."  David zipped his windproof wine jacket.  From the chair
beside him he picked up his sheepskin gloves and flat tweed cap.

"Let me know when you decide.".

"You'll be back this evening?"  Clare asked anxiously.  She pushed back
her chair and ran to him.

David hesitated.  He knew he ought to say no, that he'd come back only
if she agreed to marry him.  On the other hand, given David's absence,
that bastard Sam would move in as fast as a greased lizard.

He said, "I'll see what the weather's like when I've finished work." 
He left without kissing her.

The driver half turned to Angus.

"Sorry about this, sir.  Looks as if we might be here for some time."
The Daimler was stuck in a seemingly immovable traffic jam at
Hammersmith Broadway.

gh lightly falling snow, Angus peered impatiently conglomeration of
honking, static vehicles feeding in in five converging roads.

"I'll get to Holborn quicker if I take the underground," he decided.

"You go on to the Connaught Rooms and wait for me there."  Carrying his
briefcase, Angus slipped and stumbled through translucent brown slush,
dodging past cars, lorries, "and taxis, towards the blue sign that hung
above the station.  He was no longer confident of arriving in time for
the meeting.  He wondered briefly whether to dangle a few fivers in
front of one of the motorbike riders who were weaving their way neatly
through the traffic.  Angus decided against it better late than never
and hurried to the ticket office.

At a quarter to ten, Adam hurried across the well-swept pavement of
Cadogan Place and lowered himself into his black Porsche.

Annabel, wearing a black balaclava and ankle-length wolfs king coat,
watched the Porsche dart away and turn left into Pont Street.

She slipped 'from the inconspicuous grey BMW Sam had hired and stumbled
across the wet road towards the old red-brick building that seemed
suddenly forbidding.  When she turned the key in the lock, the black
do-or to the communal entrance hall swung open.

Why shouldn't it?  There's no reason why Adam should have changed the
locks, Annabel reassured herself as she heaved aside the old-fashioned
metal-barred door to the elevator.

And her key also opened the front door to Adam's apartment.  Annabel
crept into the hall, her wet boots making tracks across the navy
carpet.

A dark shape leapt from the floor at her.  She jumped back, alarmed.
But it was only Pitch, Adam's huge black cat.  He sprang at Annabel's
crimson boots, clawing the toes.  She bent to stroke his silky head
and whisper reassurance, then looked up.  The silence seemed
threatening.

Ahead was the door to the recently redecorated living room, which
stretched the depth of the house with windows at both ends.  To
Annabel's left was the dining room, and to her right, the kitchen.

Adam's apartment was as handsome, impersonal, and tightly controlled as
its owner.  His fashionable decorator had done a slick job: the walls
were painted in carefully chosen tones of plum, aubergine, and grey
blue; the carpet and upholstery were navy.  Eastern antiques were mixed
with the latest clear-plastic, inflatable armchairs and white pedestal
tables.

Suddenly, upstairs, a vacuum whined.  Annabel started.  Mrs.  Price
must be cleaning t1le bedroom.  What a nuisance, she thought the
Georgian desk was there.  Annabel had imagined herself going directly
to the desk and, searching it thoroughly.

Because she reckoned that the desk was the most likely hiding place,
she couldn't summon up much enthusiasm for searching elsewhere.  But
perhaps she should search the living room while Mrs.  Price was
occupied in the bedroom above it.  Or should she just march upstairs,
whistling, and use some excuse to get rid of Mrs.  Price?

Annabel decided to go straight to the desk.  Decisively she turned
right, towards the staircase.

At the top of the stairs, she stumbled over Pitch, who crouched,
invisible, against the navy-blue carpet.  The cat's yellow eyes glared
up at her, as if he knew what she was doing and wanted to protect his
master's territory.

As Annabel entered the bedroom, she saw the large black backside of
Mrs.  Price, who was picking bits of white china from the floor.  She
stood up, turned, and gave a squawk as she saw Annabel.

"Oh madam, I'd no idea you -back Mr.  Grant didn't say.  That drat ted
clumsy cat ed over an ashtray!"  Mr.  Grant doesn't know I've
returned," Annabel said cheerfully.

"It was bitterly cold in Norfolk at the health farm, so I decided to
return to town."

"You were lucky to get here, madam.  On the early morning news, they
said there was blizzards in south-east England."

"Yes, terrible blizzards," Annabel.  said hastily.  You must have left
very early, madam.  Before six.  In the dark."

"Yes.  But the train arrived on time."  Annabel wanted to say, "Go
away."

"Shall I unpack for you, madam?"  "I stupidly left my suitcase on the
train."  Annabel gave an embarrassed laugh and embroidered her lie.

"I've already telephoned the lost property office ... Luckily, a porter
handed it in.  I have to go and collect it this afternoon."

"What a nuisance, madam.  Would you like me to go for you?  Or I could
telephone Mr.  Grant's secretary.  She could have the suitcase picked
up."

"You're very kind," Annabel said.

"But ... er ... er ... I have to personally sign for it, you see, and
produce identification prove that it's mine."  Firmly she added, "What
I would like now is a hot bath."

"I haven't finished the bathroom yet, madam."

"Then please leave it until tomorrow.  Leave this room as well."
Annabel had regained her confidence: why had she been so frightened?
"Shall I take your boots to dry, madam?  They look very wet.  They need
stuffing with newspaper."

"Thank you.  I'll let you have them after my bath."

"Would you care for a cup of tea to warm you up, madam?"  Go away!  Go
away!  Annabel thought, but aloud said calmly, "No thank you, Mrs.
Price, that will be all."

Motionless, Annabel listened as Mrs.  Price padded downstairs.  Then
she ran-to the bedroom door and turned the key in the lock.  She flung
her fur coat on the floor.  In the bathroom she shoved the plug in the
tub and went through the charade of preparing a bath; while the taps
were running, she could take the drawers out without being heard.

Adam's bathroom was above the kitchen, his study above the dining room.
His bedroom also ran the width of the house; one end, which overlooked
Cadogan Place, was used as a sitting area.  Here navy sofas were
grouped around a zebra skin before a marble fireplace in which a log
fire quietly burned; dark blue shelves on either side of the fireplace
held a collection of Thai water jars.

On the opposite wall stood a George III mahogany bureau bookcase. Above
four narrow drawers, a sloping desktop could be pulled down to provide
a writing surface; above it, a glass-fronted bookcase contained a
collection of eighteenth-century drinking glasses.

On trembling legs, Annabel ran towards this splendid piece of
furniture.

Miranda wore a plain orange suit, not so short-skirted as the rest of
her clothes.  She felt nervous but excited.  Waiting in the impressive
pillared entrance hall of the Connaught Rooms, she -had already peeped
into the cream hall and seen SUPPLY KITS shareholders sitting in rows,
some stamping snow from their 'shoes, some reading newspapers.  The
city press had been having a great deal of fun, and there had been a
lot of speculation and broad hints for Miranda's private relationship
with Adam was guessed on Fleet Street.  Today's headlines had read:
SUPPLY KITS BOARDROOM CONTROL BATTLE The Times, IT'S MIRANDA V. ADAM!
Daily Mail, NEW BOSS AT SUPPLY KITS  Daily Express, and WHOOPS, IT'S
D-DAY FOR CITY SWEETHEART, MIRANDA Daily Mirror.

J a, who quite enjoyed a fight, knew that she was bdut to battle as
fiercely as a mother tiger for her wounded cub; the neglected KITS
needed all her protection, care, and attention to nurse it back to
health.

From behind her, Lord Brighton said, "Nearly time to start it's five to
ten."  Together, they moved slowly towards the hall.

Miranda!"  Miranda twisted her head backward as she heard her name
shouted.

To her astonishment, she saw the wild red-gold hair and unmistakable
Viking-sized figure of Angus Maclayne rushing towards her from the
street entrance.

"Angus!  What are you doing he re?"  "Thought I'd never make it," he
panted.

"I'm here to vote."

"But you aren't registered as a shareholder!"

Angus grinned.

"Yes I am."

"How?  Why?"  Miranda puzzled.

"I don't understand."

"I've been keeping an eye on your shares.  Didn't like it when your
holding dipped to forty-five per cent and you lost your majority,"
Angus said.

"So I started buying."

"How many shares do you own?"

Miranda asked urgently.

"Four point eight, which still won't give you a majority vote ... I had
hoped to get five point one per cent."

"Angus ... how can you own four point eight per cent?  Unless .. ."

Angus nodded.

"Highland Croft Holdings is indirectly owned by my family."  Miranda
flung her arms around him.  She mumbled into his still-damp overcoat,
"You're wonderful, Angus.  I love you for thinking of this!  Four point
eight is all I need!"

Behind her, Lord Brighton coughed.

"We should move in."

As Miranda's orange figure appeared on the platform, cameras flashed
and a rustle of excitement swept through the hall.

Walking confidently across the platform, Miranda felt exultant.  It
looked as if she controlled the votes.  Behind her back, she crossed
her fingers.

Miranda took her, seat next to Lord Brighton.  She and Adam Grant,
sitting on his Lordship's other side, ignored each other.

Annabel could just peer behind the back of the desk, which stood
against the wall; nothing was attached to it.  She pulled down the
sloping top of the central section of the desk.  The writing surface,
thus revealed, was covered b worn black leather.  Centred at the rear
was a tiny classical doorway with carved pillars on either side and a
pediment above it; on either side of this were pigeonholes, with
drawers beneath.

Her hands shaking, Annabel removed each drawer and laid it on the
navy-blue carpet in the order of its removal: she had to be careful to
put the drawers back correctly or

Adam would immediately spot that someone had been tampering with his
desk.

With a tape measure borrowed from Miranda, she measured each drawer:
all were the same width and the same depth.  Damn!

Annabel closed the sloping top and looked carefully at its beautifully
inlaid design of musical instruments."  Perhaps if she pressed some
part, it would activate a hidden mechanism.

Suddenly she realized that she couldn't hear the bathwater.

She scrambled to her feet and ran towards the bathroom.

The bath had overflowed.  Water seeped gently over the navy carpet.

"As soon as one drop leaked through the kitchen Mrs.  Price would be up
with mops and pails; she "JA the desk drawers scattered over the
carpet.  Annabel sloshed across the carpet.  Quickly she turned off the
taps and pulled out the plug her big mistake.  She threw all the towels
she could see, plus Adam's dressing gown, on the floor and then stamped
on the bundle to soak up the water.

Trembling more violently, she ran back to the desk.  Halfway there, she
changed her mind and ran back to the bathroom.  She turned on the taps
above the hand basing which she did not plug: running taps were still
necessary to camouflage any odd noises she might make.

Annabel glanced at her watch.

"Damn!"  Ten-fifteen already.  And her knees were knocking.

In the cream-coloured assembly hall, the shareholders, quiet but
expectant, looked up at Lord Brighton as he outlined the reason for the
meeting.  Miss Miranda O'Dare wished to regain control of the KITS
cosmetics business by separating it from the complex of companies into
which her original business had developed.  The KITS shops had been
losing money since the group went public; therefore, this sale might be
no great loss to the holding company.

Should the shareholders agree to the price that their independent
assessors had decided was reasonable, Miss O'Dare would pay this price
for KITS.  Should it be decided that Miss O'Dare could not buy the
company, then Miss O'Dare would resign from SUPPLY KITS as soon as her
contract expired, in three months.

Mr.  Adam Grant had also offered to buy KITS, at ten per cent above any
price that Miss O'Dare offered to pay.

Lord Brighton concluded his speech by saying that every member of
SUPPLY KITS worked hard, but nobody worked harder than Miss O'Dare,
KITS's founder.  As 'the face of the firm', Miss O'Dare was perceived
by the public to be responsible for the easy and continued success of
the company, and therefore, in his opinion, SUPPLY KITS could not
afford to lose Miss O'Dare.  They could not afford to lose her services
or the publicity generated by Miss O'Dare's presence.  Nor could they
afford to have any rival company acquire the services of Miss O'Dare. 
And should she leave, he felt certain, the share price would fall.

For these reasons, Lord Brighton recommended that the shareholders
refuse Mr.  Adam Grant's offer.  He also recommended that they show
their appreciation for Miss O'Dare's work by accepting Miss O'Dare's
offer and agreeing to sell the cosmetics chain KITS to Miss O'Dare for
the independent valuation price of fourteen thousand pounds.  Lord
Brighton moved that Miss O'Dare's offer be accepted.

Carefully Annabel ran her hands around each empty drawer space in the
desk.  She touched the backs, the sides, and the bottoms, hoping to
feel a piece of wood move very, very slightly when it shouldn't.

"Ah!"

At the base of the left-hand bank of drawers, the bottom moved ever so
slightly.  Annabel pushed it backward, then edged her nails under the
base panel.

The thin wooden panel lifted easily.  She had been right to start her
search at the desk!  Gently she lifted the panel and pulled it towards
her: attached to the end was a box ten inches wide by two inches
deep.

Annabel ran her thumb lightly over the top of the box: it yielded.  She
slid it aside and looked into the secret compartment.

the second row of seats at the Connaught Rooms, thin man with a ginger
moustache stood up.

"Mr.  Chairman, I don't go along with what you suggest."  Lord Brighton
said, "Do I understand that you object to the company's acceptance of
Miss O'Dare's offer to purchase KIT ST I "No, I'm all for that," said
the man with the ginger moustache, "but like you said, we all know how
hard Miranda I mean Miss O'Dare has worked to pay our dividends.  Why
don't we show a bit more appreciation than you suggest?  Why don't we
give KITS to her?"

There was a buzz of noise in the hall.  A woman in a beige raincoat
quickly stood up and, without addressing the chair, pointed out that
Miss O'Dare was well paid for her work; personally, she expected Miss
O'Dare to work hard for the company; personally, she was a canteen
manageress, and she also worked hard for her pay, and nobody gave her
gifts worth thousands of pounds.  So she opposed the suggestion.  She
sat down to cries of agreement.

Lord Brighton settled the matter by reminding the meeting that, by law,
no proposal of which the shareholders had not been advised by letter
could be brought up for consideration.

Annabel stared.  at the contents of the secret drawer: a battered
silver King Edward III sixpence.  Clearly, Adam did not know of the
existence of this drawer; that sixpence may have lain in it for over
two hundred years.

Annabel was bitterly disappointed.  She sat back on the heels of her
crimson thigh boots and checked her watch.  Ten forty-five already. She
looked at the desk.  Was there any point in searching it further? She
glanced upward.  Something might be hidden behind the pediment above
the doorway in the centre of the desk; something might be attached to
the underside of the base.

Annabel dragged the desk chair closer to the desk and stood on it.
Carefully she felt over the top of the bookcase.  Her hand came away
covered with dirt: obviously, Mrs.  Price's feather duster didn't move
above eye level.

Then she jumped down from the chair and lay flat on the floor to peer
beneath the desk.  As she couldn't see clearly, she felt over the
entire undersurface; had Adam lodged a notebook there, her fingers
would certainly have felt it.

Again disappointed, Annabel sat back on her he 'els and studied the
tiny classical doorway with pillars on either side.  She opened it.

Inside were two shelves and, at the top, a very small drawer, too
shallow to take anything but visiting cards and rings.  Annabel gently
withdrew the drawer: it contained only a crumpled old-fashioned white
five-pound note.

She bit her lip.  She had been so certain that this desk was Adam's
hiding place.  Before returning the little drawer, she carefully put
her hand in the opening and pressed each wooden side; none yielded. But
something didn't feel right.

It was then Annabel realized what she should do.

In the Connaught Rooms, Lord Brighton, as chairman, made sure that
anyone who wished to speak was allowed to do so.

Then the votes were taken and counted.  A rustle ran through the room.
Reporters flipped their notebooks.  Shareholders whispered excitedly to
one another.  Tension rose.

Adam glared at Miranda, and she glared back.  The shareholders voted in
Miranda's favour.  The majority was small, but Miranda didn't mind
because KITS would be sold back to her for fourteen thousand pounds:
the resolution was passed.

But the meeting was not yet finished.

I again studied the little doorway inside the desk.  JW central
structure didn't feel as secure as it should.  She took hold of the
scrolls of the Ionic pillars on either side of the doorway and tugged
them towards her.

She was either about to break a valuable antique or ... As Annabel held
her breath, the entire little doorway slid towards her: it was a box
unit, measuring about ten inches wide and deep by twelve inches high,
and it left a space of the same size in the desk.

Trembling now with excitement, she pushed her hand to the back of this
space: there was a little trough in which she could feel several small
items.

From it Annabel eagerly withdrew three small, battered, black leather
notebooks and an envelope.

The black notebooks contained page after page of neat figures in Adam's
handwriting.  The envelope contained a certificate and a crumpled
handwritten letter.

Holding her breath, willing herself to concentrate on what she was
doing, Annabel carefully replaced the central section of the desk;
then, one by one, she started to replace the little drawers.

Behind her, there was a sudden crack!  She jumped and gasped with
fright.  But it was only the sound of a smouldering log.

At the SUPPLY KITS EGM, Adam Grant, tight-lipped, stood up.  As was
appropriate, he offered his resignation from the board of directors
of

SUPPLY KITS

Mr.  Grant's resignation was accepted.  The meeting was then dissolved.
Reporters, wearing un belted raincoats, rushed towards the platform and
a glowing Miranda.

As Annabel crept downstairs, Mrs.  Pr ice appeared in the kitchen
doorway.

Seeing that Annabel was wearing her fur coat, Mrs.  Price said, "Going
out again, madam?  In this weather?"  Broom in hand, she advanced to
the bottom of the stairs.

"A hair appointment," Annabel said rapidly.

"Dare not skip an appointment with Leonard himself, not even in this
weather!"  Her heart thudded against her black skinny rib sweater as
she added, "I'm afraid I've made rather a mess of the bathroom, Mrs.
Price.  I'll explain to Mr.  Grant that it was my fault."

"Was it the overflow stuck, madam?  That's happened to Mr.  Grant a
couple of times."  Now Mrs.  Price stood before the front door.

Annabel thought wildly, Get out of my way.  Please!  Get away from that
front door!  In a worried voice, she said, "Would you mind making quite
sure I turned all the taps off?  I might have left the basin tap
running.  Awful of me."  Mrs.  Price scooted upstairs.  She didn't want
her kitchen ceiling falling down again.

Annabel flung herself through the front door and waited, trembling, for
the elevator, pressing the button anxiously over and over.  She
couldn't hear it coming up.  Damn!  Someone must have left it open down
below.

She dashed to the end of the passage, clattered down the service
stairs, and ran out to the street and headed for Sam's car, parked
farther up the road, next to the wrought-iron railings of the garden.
Before she reached it, Annabel slipped on the slush and almost fell.

Sam was feeling apprehensive as he waited.  Annabel had been in Adam's
home for nearly two hours, and there was no way of knowing when the
SUPPLY KITS meeting would end.  Just then Annabel ran across the road
towards him, and Sam could see from her excited face that her search
had been successful.  He switched on the engine purposefully, and they
were gone.

M arrived at the lawyer's office just after midday.  Sam d Annabel
watched impatiently as the big Rank Xerox dark brown photocopier slowly
copied each page of the black notebooks.  The machine gave off a slight
smell of ozone as the paper went through the heat fuser.  Obviously,
the copier was one of the older models.

"Can't it go fas terT Annabel asked, then added nervously, "Must I take
those notebooks back to Adam's apartment?"  "If we want to be safe
yes," Sam said regretfully.

"We don't want Adam to realize they're missing.  If he suspects that
we've enough evidence to put him in jail, he'll immediately whisk off
whatever cash is left, remove all evidence, and disappear."

Annabel fidgeted with a fingernail, then remembered that she was
supposed to be at the hairdresser.  She went to the cracked mirror in
the dingy cloakroom and began to comb her hair, flattened by the
balaclava, into a thick lion's mane that would rival even that of Baby
Jane Holzer.  Mrs.  Price would definitely see a change."  Heart
thudding, Annabel opened Adam's front door.  She could hear the news on
the radio in the sitting room, which, meant that he was in.  Her heart
sank as she slowly entered the room.

"Where the hell have you been?"  Adam asked irritably.  A glass of
whisky in one hand, he sat in one of the transparent inflatable
armchairs.

"I told you in my note.  I've been at the St.  Ivory health farm."

"You said a health farm.  You didn't say which one," Adam said
crossly.

"Suppose someone had wanted to get in touch with you?  Suppose
something had happened to your grandmother?"  "I'm so sorry," Annabel
said.

"I just didn't think .. ."  Her voice trailed away.

Well, hurry up.  I've just told Mrs.  Price to serve lunch."  Adam did
not kiss her.

Annabel wondered if she could -endure lunch, knowing that proof of her
theft was a few feet away, in her scarlet leather shoulder bag.  She
decided to replace the documents immediately; it would be a risk, but
Adam was sitting down with a fresh drink, and she'd be able to do it in
three minutes.

"I'll just take off my wet boots," she said.

Taking her bag with her, Annabel hurried upstairs to the bedroom.  By
the time she reached the top of the stairs, her knees were weak with
fear.

She shut the' bedroom door, but did not dare lock it.  Moving quickly
to the desk, she pulled out the sloping desktop.

Slowly she edged out the elaborate central box.  Hands trembling, she
opened her bag and replaced the notebooks and envelope, then edged the
box back into place and closed the desk flap.

A wave of relief swept over her, only to be replaced by terror as she
turned away from the desk.

Adam was standing in the doorway, watching her.

"Looking for stamps The asked pleasantly.

"Second drawer down on the left-hand side.  I've brought you a Campan
and soda tell me if you want more Campari in it.  And do hurry down,
darling.  Mrs.  Price is getting tetchy.  You know she likes to leave
promptly at three o'clock."

"She's had a trying morning.  I'm afraid I flooded the bathroom again."
With a great effort, Annabel took the drink, and Adam left the room.
She collapsed on the sofa and, with shaky hands, tugged her boots
off.

Had he seen her?  If so, why hadn't he said anything?  He couldn't
have.  It was too unbearable to think about.

Adam carefully closed the door of the fiving "He needed time to think. 
There was only one thing Annabel could have been looking for in that
desk.  Her face told him that she'd found the notebooks.  Had she
hidden them in her clothes?  Or in her purse?  Was she about to deliver
them to someone outside?  Annabel wasn't smart enough to be in this
alone.  And she certainly wasn't smart enough to understand what was in
those notebooks.  Someone who did know how important they were had
clearly sent Annabel here to steal them ... and that person must be
waiting somewhere outside.  Adam could search her purse, he could
search her person; he could certainly find and remove the notebooks but
that unknown someone would still come after them.

He had to think clearly, control his momentary panic.  Okay his next
move should be to conVince Annabel's accomplice that he didn't have the
notebooks.  But how could that be arranged?  Suppose Annabel was given
all the space she needed to take anything she wanted out of this house?
And then suppose she was mugged and her purse stolen before she had a
chance to give those notebooks to anyone else?  She'd have to be beaten
up a little to make the mugging look convincing ... but the bitch
deserved it ... Yes, that was it.  He had to keep calm there were still
a lot of things to work out.  He needed to arrange for someone to
follow Annabel until she was in a relatively quiet spot where she could
be jumped.  Maybe he needed two people, in case her accomplice was
lurking outside his front door.  In that case, they would both have to
be taken care of.  Maybe three men would be needed ... Mike would be
able to arrange it.  God, he hoped he'd be able to get hold of Mike ...
And maybe he'd better drop everything and get out of the country
without waiting until the rest of the money had been funnelled out.
Most of the money was out there, waiting for him ... He didn't think
there was anything the police could hold him for, but then everyone
caught in some sharp practice thought that.  If he got out fast, he'd
be taking no chances ... But suppose the airports were already being
watched?  ... Steady, steady no need to panic.  There was no need to
worry.  If someone got hold of the notebooks, that someone still
wouldn't know where the money was, or how to get it.  No, he had
nothing to fear, so long as he kept his head ... Still, it wouldn't be
a bad idea to arrange for the notebooks to be 'stolen', and to let them
rough up that bitch Annabel while they were about it that would teach
the little whore a lesson ... and if her accomplice was also beaten up,
then Adam would discover who he was.  Maybe she'd been reconciled to
that smart-ass husband of hers Mr.  Hotshot Reporter ... He'd get them
both, mess up both their pretty faces ... Yes.

Now that he'd decided what to do, all that remained was to locate Mike.
Obviously, it would -take Mike some time to make these arrangements, so
he would have to keep Annabel here until Mike's people were in place. 
But he knew the perfect way to stall Annabel ... What better way to
kill time than by giving the bitch a fuck she'd never forget?

Adam reached for the telephone.-As he listened to the rings, he
nervously tugged his hair over his left eye, then jerked his head up to
flip it back into place.

"Mike?  Thank God I've reached you.  I'm in trouble ... I knew you
would ... Look, I need you to take care of someone for me ... I
promise, I wouldn't ask you if it wasn't absolutely necessary ... No, I
only want you to frighten someone ... Thanks ... Right now, as a matter
of fact ... 19m sorry ... Thanks ... Well, it's Annabel O'Dare
""AYJX,0U bloody well just said you would!  Mike, I'm sunk if
.joi.Aon't!  When I explain later, you'll see there's no alternative
for me short of pushing her out of the window, or jumping myself... No,
no, of course I won' tV Quickly Adam explained that he had just seen
Annabel deliberately steal carefully hidden documents that could put
him behind bars.

"What she's nicked are details of some bank transactions.  It won't do
her a blind bit of 1-stood because she doesn't know where to find the
bank Account numbers."  Adam's voice sounded increasingly desperate as
he whispered, "I've got to find the bastard she's working with.  I've
got to find out who's after my notebooks .. . and I've got to scare
Annabel so badly that she'll refuse to do it again or involve the
police ... "Why don't I frighten her?  Because, Mike, it's more
frightening if someone else does it.  Shows them I have powerful
friends.  Makes Annabel feel that even if I'm put behind bars, she'll
still be vulnerable ... Yes, of course I know it's also safer for me.
Look, I want this done by someone else for exactly the same reason Toby
Stitch gets other people to do this sort of thing.

"Mike, I swear I need you on this ... I swear you'll understand when I
tell you the whole story ... As a matter of fact, I'm scared stiff.  If
I can't frighten her off, I'll have to leave the country for good ...
Thanks, Mike ... How long will you need to arrange it?  ... Yes, yes, I
can keep her here for another couple of hours.  Thanks."  Triumphantly
Adam replaced the receiver.

They ate a pleasant but not very enterprising meal of green pea soup,
grilled Dover sole, and a too stiff chocolate mousse, followed by a
perfect, ripe Camembert.

Over lunch, Adam chatted agreeably about nothing much: John Lennon's
blossoming romance with Yoko Ono; whether the Americans actually would
land a man on the moon; whether Golda Meir would be Israel's first
woman prime minister; whether Annabel wanted to stay in that evening or
dance at Sybilla's.

To Annabel, every minute seemed to stretch to an hour.  She felt
ashamed, confused and worried because she knew that she wasn't a very
good actress.  A screen test in LA had once confirmed this.

As he finished his coffee, Adam stared across the table at her
elaborate coiffure.  He said, "I know you've spent the entire morning
at the hairdresser having your hair put up like Marie Antoinette's. But
I feel an irresistible impulse to tear it all down."  Smiling, he stood
up, walked around to Annabel's seat, drew her chair back for her, took
her firmly by the wrist, and led her to the stairs.

It was a quarter to three.  Mike had said not before five o'clock, by
which time it would be dark.

CHAPTER 30

FRIDAY, 31 JANUARY 1969

irmly Adam led Annabel up the stairs.  She had no choice but to follow
him.  She dared not suddenly act out of vitaracter: should she seek
excuses to avoid going to bed Mith him, it would be the first time.
Adam, whose reactions were as fast and instinctive as those of his
damned huge cat, would immediately guess that there was another reason
for Annabel's refusal.

He would ask questions, silky smooth and casual at first but gradually
becoming sharper, faster, and more pointed.  Annabel knew that she
would become flustered; she would allow herself to be led into the trap
of contradicting herself and then that many-toothed trap would snap
shut!  She had watched Adam do this to others why not to her?

And though the apartment was warm, and Adam's hand was warm, Annabel
felt her body chill and the hair -prickle on the back of her neck.  His
strong, insistent fingers firmly clasped her wrist as they climbed the
stairs: his hand felt like a handcuff, impossible to unshackle.

Annabel dreaded what was about to happen.  She could not bear Adam to
touch her, could not bear to think that she had ever allowed him to
touch her; she could not bear to think that once she had willingly
offered her body to him willingly opened herself, her mind, and her
affection.  Without much hope, she longed for some distraction, some
possibility of escape, some means of putting off this humiliation.  On
the other hand, she was anxious to get this final ordeal finished and
escape.

Adam was now leading her towards his bedroom as he would a call girl
for a little light entertainment on a wintry afternoon.  The only way
Annabel's situation differed was that the call girl would be paid and
would probably feel indifference, for it was something she had chosen
to do, and in a way, she would feel wanted.

Of course, Adam would probably prefer a call boy.  Briefly Annabel
remembered the moment at the pub when he had given a lingering kiss to
that boy and, for the first time, she had seen Adam's emotions not
under his usual firm control: she had seen him openly relaxed and
happy.  Before that moment, she hadn't understood why he had insisted,
so successfully, that Miranda keep their long affair a secret but now
she knew what might have happened if those two had become engaged:
blackmail.  The boy he had kissed was unlikely to be the only one.
Annabel supposed that discarded male lovers felt as bruised, battered,
and resentful as female ones and might similarly seek revenge,
especially accompanied by wads of cash.

As Adam opened his bedroom door, Annabel felt revulsion and
self-disgust.  Standing aside to let her enter, he released his grip on
her wrist.  She smelled his erotic, country smell as she passed before
him, and it made her nearly nauseous.

She watched Adam's big black cat jump from the bed and run forward; he
rubbed sinuously against Adam's leg.  Pitch was as wary and as
independent as his master, and Adam was fond of Pitch, primarily
because Pitch seemed determined not to b 'e fond of Adam.  Pitch might
stretch out on the ocelot cover of Adam's bed, but when Adam climbed
into the bed, Pitch jumped off.

Outside, against a bleak, pale sky, the witch fingers of the trees in
Cadogan Place bent beneath the weight of snow still on their branches.
Adam drew the curtains.  He said, "I won't switch on the lights."  The
firelight threw flickering shadows over his thin, taut face, making his
dark eyebrows seem longer, more saturnine.

sat on an armchair and pulled Annabel to him until SM stood between his
knees.  His warm hands slowly travelled up her legs, over sheer black
nylon.

Adam said, "You're wearing tights!"  it's a very cold day."  Wearily
Annabel thought that she must be the only woman in London not allowed
to wear Oghts when it was snowing.  But Adam liked to peel off lace
bikinis, suspender belt, high-heeled shoes, and stockings, in that
order.  Sometimes he did not peel them all off.

"Naughty, naughty."  Adam unzipped Annabel's black suede miniskirt. She
felt his hands beneath her black skinny-rib sweater.

"Dear me, nothing at all," he said.  He pulled up her sweater, and when
her face was hidden and her arms trapped, he licked her nipples.

When she was naked except for her black tights, Adam said, "Don't
move!"  He stood up and walked towards the Georgian desk.

Annabel suddenly felt very frightened.  Adam opened a drawer and
produced a pair of scissors.  He turned and said, "You're shivering!
Surely you can't be cold with this roaring log fir eT "I'm ...
excited," Annabel gulped.  She found it difficult to breathe.

Adam returned, sat, and again pulled her to him.

"I told you never to wear tights.  So I'm cutting these into
stockings."  He hooked one finger over the waistband and drew it,
towards him.  The scissors flashed in the firelight.  Adam pulled at
each thigh and snipped until the jagged tights dangled down Annabel's
legs.

She felt him stroke her hair.

"You're so silky," he murmured.

"Some women are like an old saucepan scourer down there."  Adam never
let a woman forget that she was not the only one.

Annabel felt him lick her: sick at heart, she felt her body melt,
respond.

He looked up and whispered, "You're very tense.  Are you frighten ed?"
"Yes," Annabel breathed truthfully.

"I'm not surprised," Adam said.

"You've disobeyed my orders.  Don't move."

Again he moved towards the antique desk.  And again Annabel felt
terrified.  Her heart seemed to leap up into the back of her mouth. She
swallowed with difficulty.  She held her breath.  Was this some
cat-and-mouse game?

Adam returned with a Victorian baby's hairbrush, very soft and backed
with ivory.

"First I'll brush your bush, and then you can do it to me."  He stroked
her pubic hair lightly, slowly, rhythmically.

"Adam ... Can't we just ... go to bed?"  Annabel had now faced the fact
that bed was unavoidable and the sooner she got into it, the sooner she
would be able to get out of it.

Adam put down the hairbrush and said, "Of course we're going to bed.
Turn around."

Annabel did so.  Adam stood up and pulled the pins from her elaborately
dishevelled coiffure; he pushed both hands into the long fair strands
at the base of her skull and started to shake her hair free.

He said, "Your neck is rigid.  You're very tense!  What's the mat terT
"Nothing," Annabel quavered.

"I'm just tired.  I know it's only three in the afternoon but that's
just how I feel."

"I know what to do to women who are too tired."  He carried her to the
bathroom, where he pulled off her shredded tights; together, they stood
naked beneath the warm shower.  He carefully soaped her body all over,
watched her nipples harden.  With difficulty, Annabel smiled at him.

Adam played the warm hand spray over each smooth and crevice of her
body; then he wrapped her in a bkMowel and carried her to his bed.  I.
$A pretty picture," he said, looking at Annabel's plump white body on
the ocelot bedspread.

He moved to one of the side tables; they were antique -Thai chests with
elaborate silver locks, and upon each one, in -an eighteen-inch-high
pewter holder, stood a huge, thick aubergine candle, which he now lit.
Adam's skilled lovemaking was never mechanical because he was genuinely
interested in having a woman at his mercy hooked on him.  He liked to
manoeuvre his women partners into a sexual relationship in which they
became increasingly subordinate to him in bed and eventually gave over
to him total responsibility for their erotic response.

Unlike most men, Adam had developed his gift of imagination, and put it
to use.  Fantasy was an important part of his lovemaking because he saw
that it excited women.  He was adept at playing Rhett Butler, Lewis
Carroll or Petruchio; master and slave girl, doctor and nurse, vicar
and choir girl teacher and schoolgirl.

Adam was especially attractive to the woman who liked the fantasy of
being 'forced" to have sex with some authority figure: this exonerated
her childish feelings of guilt and her wickedness for thinking sexy
thoughts.  When his partner eventually confided them, Adam always acted
out her own fantasies, which aroused her even more.

Whatever their wishes, there were few women who did not stagger, dazed
by pleasure, from Adam's long bedroom.

Annabel, however, felt only cold apprehension as, lying on Adam's bed,
she watched him go back to the bathroom and return carrying thick white
towels.  She looked up at his well-muscled body, at the shadow of hair
that ran from his neck to his thick penis, and she thought: Oh God,
he's going to give me a massage.

She wouldn't be able to get away for at least another hour!

Adam picked up a cut-gld-ss bottle of baby oil; he warmed some in his
hands.

It was warm and still in the bedroom.  Annabel 'listened to the soft
strains of "The Swan of Tuonela': Sibelius always made her feel as if
she were in a cosy, dark hut, in the middle of a quiet, snowy forest,
while hungry wolves howled faintly on a distant skyline.

She lay face down on the bed as Adam started to rub his oiled hands
slowly over every inch of her body, movements that were firm but fluid,
and never hurt.

Using the entire surface of his hands, keeping his fingers together, he
blended each movement into the next.  His stroking seemed one smooth
and continuous motion as he moved silently from one part of her body to
the next, always keeping to the same rhythm and pressure, always
repeating each movement three times.  Adam smoothed her body until it
felt supple as satin.  Annabel felt her eyes close and her thoughts
drift- away.  Slowly his hands travelled upward.

Then she felt his tongue on her spine, gently moving up it ... down ...
and up again.

"Feel bet terT Adam's voice caressed her as softly as his hands. 
Gently he pried her thighs apart and stroked them, first with his
fingertips, then with his tongue.  He turned her over.  As his lips
touched her breast, Annabel quivered with pleasure.  She breathed, half
panting now, as if she had been running.

As his head befit over her, she felt his warm breath just before his
lips touched hers; she felt her own lips part before the moist,
insistent tip of his tongue; she felt his tongue thrust deep into her
mouth.  Softly Annabel groaned.  It was not only as if Adam were
playing her Eke a fine violin but as if the entire Philharmonic string
section "Vftying arpeggios over every ring inch of her qui ve the
chords ascending, then descending, in rapid soccemion, without stop.

Adam knew so well the responses of her body, how to gradually excite
her to frenzy, so that she neither knew Where she was, or with whom,
nor cared who knew it or might observe them.

she groaned with pleasure, Annabel forgot that this j" had clawed and
shredded her emotions, had sought to her family and might have
succeeded.  She knew only it the animal smell of his body, so close to
hers, made her lose all grip on reason, and the hard force of that
muscular weight against her softness made her forget everything but
their swiftly rising passion.  I How could I do this?  Annabel thought
fleetingly, and then she did.

Just after four o'clock, Miranda appeared at the offices of Owen and
Fraser.  The orange suit that she had worn to the EGM was very
crumpled; she looked a little dazed and very happy: clearly, Angus had
found New York educational, but Miranda was too pleased to feel
jealous.

She was shown into a room with a large oval table in the centre, strewn
with paper.  Behind a pile of documents, Sam sat beside Richard
Fraser.

"You're late," Sam said crossly.

"And so's Annabel.  It's after four.  God knows why the traffic comes
to a standstill all over this island whenever it rains or snows!  You'd
have thought that by now they'd have all gotten used to the idea that
this is normal British weather."

"Sorry, Sam.  Everything went as planned at my end."  Miranda
smirked.

"Did Annabel find anything?"

"She found three notebooks in Adam's desk.  She left here at one
o'clock to put them back where she found them."  Sam nodded towards the
papers piled on the table.

"These are photostats."  He did not mention the envelope hidden in his
jacket pocket.

With a smile, Richard Fraser said, "We've got what we need to prove
your case."

"What have you found

"The notebooks contain details of each financial transaction, as Grant
moved the money from one bank account to another, until it became
untraceable.  They clearly show which bank account each sum of money
eventually reached."  Sam added, "He seems to have five final bank
accounts in which the money accumulates; they are referred to as
accounts A, B, C, D, and E. Unfortunately, the notebooks don't give the
account numbers or addresses of the banks; they might all be in a
single Swiss bank' or scattered in five different places throughout the
world.  There's no way of telling from the notebooks."

"Of course," Richard Fraser went on, "Grant could remember the names of
the banks and their addresses: it's not difficult to remember that your
A account is in Bank Leu, Zurich.  But he must have some record of the
numbers of these five bank accounts, because without the correct
number, you cannot have access to a numbered bank account."  Sam said,
"So although we now have hard evidence to convict Adam of embezzlement,
we can't get the money back until we find where it is.  So there's
still a missing bit to our puzzle..  Now we've got to look for a list
of five numbers."  "I'm glad we can nail the bastard," Miranda said.

"But I'm worried about Annabel.  What could have happened to her?" 
"Her cab's probably stuck in a traffic jam," Sam grunted.

"But if you say she left here around one o'clock, she should have got
to Cadogan Place by .. . two at the latest," lkmdo.Valculated.

"So she should have been back here by ffi W matter how bad the traffic
was."  0" A.tl ?Aaybe someone was there," Sam said.

"Maybe Adam turned up, and she hasn't yet been able to put the stuff
back,in the desk.  She said once Adam yelled at her when he saw her
open it."  6.1 suppose we couldn't telephone ... T "If Adam's not
there, then we can.  But if he's there why would you be telephoning
him, Miranda?  Why would you telephone Annabel?  And how could I know
that Annabel's the re?"  "She might have phoned you."  Sam shook his
head.

"By now that matron has reported back to Adam," he said, assuming
incorrectly.

"So he knows Clare and I took Elinor from the nursing home.  We gave
our real names and showed our passports.  It's clear 'that we suspect
dirty work.  So I cart exactly telephone him for a friendly chatV
"Annabel might have had an accident," Miranda worried.

ou women blow a raindrop into a storm," Sam said.  "If I telephone the
police, they'll think I'm crazy.  "My should have been back an hour ago
so I thought I'd better report her as a missing person."" Seeing
dubious expression, he relented and picked up the telephone.

"Still, if she's been in an accident, the police'll know about it."
Richard Fraser said, "We've still got work here, Sam.  Let Miranda call
the police while we finish listing these documents."  Just after
five-thirty, Fraser looked up from the boardroom table and said, "It
looks as if most of the trust money has been transferred to these five
accounts.  There seems to be about seventeen per cent of the original
sum left in the trust."

"How did he manage to shift it?  Miranda asked.

"Most of the money was sent to a Hong Kong firm of investment brokers,
who deducted three per cent in various ways, then passed the remainder
to bank accounts A, B, C, and D. Grant never sent further money to
these brokers until the previous amount had been passed to the A, B, C,
or D accounts: that's one reason why it's taken a long time to process
the money."

"Adam didn't trust th em?"  Miranda said.

"Why should he?"  Fraser replied.

"The Hong Kong brokers take a commission of three per cent for legally
laundering the money.  I expect they'll be able to produce "records" to
account for every penny; on paper, it'll look as though they're mighty
unlucky stockbrokers: either the firms they invest in go bankrupt, or
the stock dives shortly after they've invested in it.  Although not all
the money passed to them has been lbst.  They still hold some of it as
a stockbroker easily might in the account referred to as E. I would
guess that's a genuine investment account, to give a little
plausibility to their cover story."

"The fraud squad should We interested in this Hong Kong outfit," Sam
said.

Fraser said laconically, "Probably nothing they can do about it because
it's outside UK jurisdiction.  But I expect they can now pick up
Grant."  He pulled over the telephone and dialled.

"Detective Inspector Piper?  ... The O'Dare case.  I'm looking at clear
evidence that you can smack him with.  I'll need a couple of days to
get it in order and check it carefully, but by Monday morning I should
have enough for you to act on ... The photostats of his account books
... Yes, all in Grant's handwriting, according to Miss O'Dare ... No,
we haven't any bank statements yet ... I know you need to see that the
money ends up in a bank statement in Grant's name but in the meantime,
surely you won't let Grant leave the country?  There's certainlyAgh
stuff, right in front of me, for you to ask him for q:" ljowith your
inquiries ... Okay, I'll bring it straight over to you ... Certainly,
with one of the family to lodge the complaint."  "Come on, let's go."
Sam stood up.

Miranda protested, "It's nearly six o'clock.  I'm worried about Annabel
she should have been back here three .hpurs ago!  I don't like to leave
without her.  Can't Detective Inspector Piper do something about
finding her?"  Richard Fraser shook his head.

"He's fraud squad.  And You Ive already notified the police."  "Look,
we're all worried," Sam admitted.

"But what can we do except tough it out?  And move in on Adam as fast
as possible?"  "I'm going round to Adam's place now," Miranda said.

"Don't try to talk me out of ill" Sam sighed and turned to Fraser.

"You take this stuff to Piper's office.  We'll meet you there as soon
as possible.  I can't let Miranda go by herself."  After the door had
shut behind the accountant, Sam said, "Before we leave, I think you
should have a swift look at these."  He pulled two creased sheets of
paper from his pocket and handed them to Miranda.

Miranda scanned the first document.  She looked puzzled.

"This is my birth certificate.  How did you get it?  Why give it to me
now?"  She glanced at it again.

"Hang on .  This isn't my birth certificate!"

Mystified, Miranda once again scanned the white sheet of paper, with
its royal crest, headed: "Certificate of Birth."  She read aloud,
""Name, Miranda Patricia.  Sex, girl.  Name of mother, Patricia Doreen
Kettle.  Name of father, William Montmorency O'Dare.  Date of birth,
seven November 1941.  Place of birth and registration district, St.
Pancras.  Subdistrict, south-west St.  Pancras.  Certified to have been
compiled from records..  .""

Miranda looked at Sam.

"This birth certificate says that Daddy Billy was my father!  What
rubbish!"

Sam said nothing.  Miranda looked again at the certificate.

"Miranda Patricia O'Dare is my name all right, but who is this woman
called Patricia Doreen Kettle?  She isn't my mother!  And this isn't my
birthday!"

Sam shrugged his shoulders.

"Look at the other paper."  The second sheet of paper bore the
letterhead of Swithin, Timmins and Grant; it was handwritten and dated
17 March 1942.  Slowly Miranda read: "My dear Elinor, I beg you to do
nothing hasty.  Miranda is now Billy's only surviving child, and so she
might, one day, have a claim to Larkwood, together with the entire
estate.  Because of this, I advise you on no account to destroy her
genuine birth certificate.  Yours, in haste, devotedly, Joe."  Miranda
looked up and said, "So if these documents aren't forgeries or jokes, I
am Daddy Billy's daughter, not his granddaughter.  But if this Patricia
Doreen Kettle was my mother, then ... Edward and Jane weren't my
parents ... and I'm not related to Elinor!"

CHAPTER 31

1 AY, 31 JANUARY 1969

Sam and Miranda hurried from the lawyer's office through gShtly falling
snow.  Miranda impatiently brushed snow fink from her face and beckoned
to her driver, waiting at the opposite kerb in her silver Mercedes.

Before the driver could pull over, a taxicab shrieked to a stop in
front of her.  The driver jumped out and hurried around to open the
door for his passenger, but before he could reach it, the door
opened.

The passenger collapsed on to the trampled, grimy snow at Miranda's
feet.

"Annabel!"  Miranda recognized the wolfs king coat and crimson boots.
She knelt in the snow beside her sister.

The driver said to Sam, "I wanted to take the lady to St.  George's
Casualty, guy, but she made me bringer 'ere."

Annabel's face was unrecognizable.  Her swollen left eyelid was badly
torn, leaving the top of her eyeball ex-.  posed; the eye was cut and
bloody.  Her flattened nose was i clearly broken.  Two front teeth were
missing from her open, bleeding mouth.

"What happened?"

"I picked 'er up at the junction of Cadogan Lane and Pont Street.  She
was staggering about.  Matter o" fact, I thought she'd 'ad a bit too
much to drink.  Then I saw the blood."

"Thank you.  She'll be okay with us."  Sam thrust notes into his
hand.

"Hey, wait a minute, guy.  You gotta give me your name and address.
Sorry, but we 'ave to report this sort of thing to the police."

The casualty ward doctor bent over Annabel.

"Bad bruising on the face ... left eye cut ... Looks as if there's a
loss of one muscle, which will have to be restitched.  The two front
teeth can be dealt with later.  Fractured nasal septum ... Fractured
left radius and ulna ... Fractured fifth, sixth, and seventh ribs on
the left side ... severe abrasion on stomach, chest, and legs."  He
stood up.

"I can't cope with all this.  Nurse, please call the emergency eye
doctor and get an orthopaedic specialist to look at the fractured
forearm.  Clean her up and get her to the operating theatre fast.  Give
her a normal anaesthetic, but with a muscle relaxant."  Sam telephoned
C i, the Major Crimes Branch of the Metropolitan Police, from the
hospital pay phone.  He doubted that Annabel's mugging was a
coincidence.  If he was right, this case was no longer merely a case of
fraud.  It was also assault and battery, grievous bodily harm, and
attempted perhaps actual murder.

After talking to Ci, Sam checked his watch: seven-thirty p.m. in London
meant two-thirty p.m. in New York.  He called Scott's office.

Annabel lay in the operating room, her hair tucked beneath a green
plastic cap, as the medical team the ophthalmic surgeon, the
orthopaedic surgeon, the casualty doctor, the hospital emergency
anaesthetist, the nursing sister, and two nurses prepared to go about
their business.

After the anaesthetic was administered, the orthopaedic surgeon cleared
up and stitched the abrasions; then Annabel's fractured left arm was
gently put' back in place and set in plaster, and her ribs strapped
back.  These matters were dealt with quickly and easily, but the eye
operation was a far more delicate matter.

"We're looking at major trauma to the eye," the ophthalmic surgeon said
after his initial examination.

"I'm going t. clean up initially.  She's lost that left eye muscle and
h left eye.  She's had a nasty laceration, and *Adse er th e,re;s a lot
of abrasion as well as damage to the cornea.  If I can save the eye,
she'll need at least one further major operation, when the bruising and
lacerations have subsided.  At this stage, I can't say whether her
sight will be impaired indefinitely."

The eye operation took over an hour.  Afterwards, the ophthalmic
surgeon removed his-gloves and ran his hands over his face wearily.  He
washed, then again donned his dinner jacket; without being asked, the
sister tied his black bowtie.  He hurried off.

After Annabel's nose was set, she was given a sedative injection.  It
was ten p.m. when she was wheeled into a dimly lit ward filled with
other recovering emergency patients.

At three in the morning, she became conscious of the pain: it hurt to
breathe.  She felt such pain in her head that she winced with each
laboured breath.

Upon hearing her groan, the nurse sitting by her bedside spoke
reassuringly.

"You're in hospital, Mrs.  Svensn.  You've had an accident.  You're
going to be all right.  Your family are waiting outside.  We had to
give you an injection, before we tidied you up, and the effects are
wearing off now, which is why you're waking up."

"I ... can't ... see."  Her words were slurred and muffled, almost as
though she were drunk.

"That's because your left eye is bandaged, and your right eye is very
swollen."  She fed Annabel a little water from a cup with a spout.  As
the water dribbled into her mouth, Annabel retched.  The nurse sponged
her lips and continued to soothe her until Annabel drifted into an
uneasy sleep.

SATURDAY, I FEBRUARY 1969

As soon as Miranda opened her eyes, she reached for the ivory telephone
at her bedside.

"It's only seven o'clock.  The hospital said you couldn't call before
nine," Angus sleepily reminded her.

"I'd forgotten."  In the pale winter sunlight, Miranda sighed, then
stretched luxuriously.

"Well."  well, well," she said softly.

"I've been practising," Angus murmured smugly.

"No more practice needed."  Gently she pinched his rather large ear.

"I'm a jealous woman."

"So now will you marry meT Miranda propped herself on one elbow.

"Hold on, darling, give me time to collect my thoughts."  She was
delighted by his proposal.  The big obstacle clearly no longer existed:
she would be happy to stay in bed with Angus for the rest of the week,
and to live with him for the rest of her life.  She was confident that
they would live happily ever after, for all the reasons she had
originally become engaged to him.  But she couldn't think about the
future until she had resolved the present.  But she Wasn't going to
risk hurting Angus or herself again by making up her mind in a hurry
although now that it was behind her, she could admit to herself how
much she had regretted breaking off their engagement.

By ten a.m."  Annabel was vaguely aware of nurses" voices, of squashy
rubber-soled shoes treading a rubber floor, china clinking, a radio
playing soft music.  She could smell antiseptic.

Her right hand was warm.  It was being held in somebody else's hand.

Annabel whispered, "Scott?"  "I've been here for over an hour, angel."
56o don't ... leave me."  ain."  g ,tTn so ... sorry."

"So am V During his long flight, Scott had been able to think of
nothing but Annabel and their marriage.  He had eventually decided that
there were no innocent partners in 4-troubled marriage, and if one
spouse pointed an accusing loger at the other, it was probably an
unrealistic way to solve the problems and save the marriage..  Annabel
had not been his wife and partner: he had always expected her to be his
second lieutenant, to submerge her individuality to his needs, and to
be displayed Scott's status symbol.  He suspected that if she hadn't
fallen for that bastard Adam, she'd have fallen for someone else
someone who was prepared to make the effort to make her feel that he
cared for her as a person and not as a supportive prop to his
self-image as a smart and successful career man.

Scott kissed Annabel's hand.  In a frenzied whisper, he told her what
he had been longing to say: "I thought my job was a good enough reason
to neglect everything else, angel -I didn't mean for it to suck up all
my time and energy.  Things are going to be different, Annabel.  I want
to be successful, but I also want my life."  In spite of her woozy
state, Annabel could feel his warmth and tenderness.  She could feel
the difference between Scott's loving attention and the skilful but
detached and uninvolved attention she received from Adam.

She whispered, "Scott, I'm so ashamed."

"So am I. In future, I'll be looking after you."  He rested his cheek
on her arm, which lay on the bedclothes.

"What's..  . happened ... to meT Annabel asked.

"A couple of guys mugged you and snatched your purse.  The police have
to ask you a few things, later.  You've got a broken arm and ribs, and
... they reset your nose.  It will look exactly the same the surgeon
swore it would."

"My eyes feel funny."

"They punched your face, angel."  "Are my eyes going to be all right?"
Scott hesitated.

"Of course."

"You're such a bad liar, Scott."  After a moment, he said, "Your right
eye will be fine."  Annabel's soft sobs hurt her broken ribs.

"You'll certainly be able to see," Scott said.

"And it doesn't matter to me ... Oh Christ, I shouldn't have told you."
V want to know ... I don't want to be treated like a child any more."

"You won't be."  Scott again kissed her hand.

"In fac 't, if you still want it ... I know I've always argued that New
York was no place to bring up a child ... But what the hell other
people do it.  Why shouldn't weT

Annabel stopped crying.

"Can you remember what happened, madam?"  the unseen policeman asked
quietly.

"Not much," Annabel whispered.

"But I'll try."  Just after five cclock, Annabel had left Adam's home,
explaining that she was late for a dress fitting.  As she hurried
along, her crimson boots occasionally slipped on the slush.  She turned
left into Pont Street, where she thought she could probably get a cab.
There was nobody in sight and very little passing traffic.

Annabel was vaguely aware that a small woman in dark clothes had
emerged from the recessed door of a flower shop already closed for the
night on the corner of Cadogan Lane.  As Annabel hurried past, this
woman suddenly leapt towards her.  Expertly she thrust her left index
and middle fingers up Annabel's nostrils, which jerked her head
backward.  At the same time, the woman hooked her right foot around
Annabel's left boot and tugged it beI's arms circled wildly as she
slipped on the she tried to regain her balance but failed.  She crashed
backwards.  From behind, she heard a, car draw up.  In the light of
the.  st .tlamp, she looked up and saw two men with stockinp pulled
over their heads, flattening their features into Umfying, inhuman
shapes.

As the two men jerked Annabel to her feet, twisting her so that she
faced the street, she felt the woman grab her led shoulder bag, then
saw her jump into the car, take the -Wheel, and rev the engine.  I With
a thug on either side of her, Annabel was held in aid-air.  Her elbows
pinioned to her body, she was dragged to the rear of an old Morris
Minor parked in Cadogan Lane.

As one of her attackers swiftly and roughly searched her, the other
hissed, "We've got a message for you.  Remember for the future if you
make trouble, you get trouble!"  He drew back his fist, then smashed it
in Annabel's jaw.

He continued to hit her with a professional boxer's skill and a steady'
rhythm as the second man held her more or less upright.  Annabel felt
agonizing pain in her kidneys; her left ribs seemed to explode. She
felt a blow to her chest, then could no longer breathe as her nose was
smashed.  After the first punch in her eye, she began to lose
consciousnes "Better leave it at that," she heard the second man grunt
as she passed out.

"You know what happened last time."  In her bronze Reliant Scimitar,
Miranda drove Sam to Wiltshire, where Josh was waiting for his dad. Sam
had spent the night at the hospital, and felt as stiff and stale as
yesterday's bread, but he had promised Josh that he would see him over
the weekend.  And Miranda wanted to talk to Elinor about the birth
certificate.

Jet lag was now catching up with Sam, but Miranda's fast driving over
snowy roads in the sports car was sufficiently suspenseful to keep him
awake.

Clare waited for them, alone in her kitchen.  Elinor and Buzz were
having their afternoon nap on the twin beds in the guest room.  Josh
had happily scuttled off to a Cubs meeting.  David, who had to attend
the annual meeting of the Kennet and Avon Canal Trust, wasn't due to
arrive until evening.

Clare had told David about Annabel's horrific assault, and that she had
lost her left eye, but the doctor had warned her not to tell the two
older women yet- such a shock might well delay her grandmother's
recovery.  Although Elinor was still too weak to leave her bed and
still spoke in a whisper, she was recovering faster than the doctor had
expected; she was responding well to the Parentrovite injections, and
her old vitality was returning.

Shortly after three p.m."  the Scimitar slid to a halt in front of
Applebank Cottage.

Seeing the weary faces of the occupants, Clare asked no questions as
she placed the white tureen of mulligatawny soup on the kitchen
table.

Sam fell asleep at the table after the cheese omelette and before Clare
could serve her apple tart with apricot glazing.

Miranda yawned and said, "I didn't get much sleep last night either.
Mind if I have a nap on Josh's bed?"  She disappeared.

Clare gently woke Sam and led him upstairs to her bedroom.

At six o'clock, Sam opened his eyes.  He could hear faint classical
music.  The green chintz curtains hadn't yet been closed, and in the
firelight, he could see the snow beating silently from the darkness
against the windowpanes.

He stretched out a hand, groped for the bedside light, and knocked a
brass alarm clock to the floor.  jan upstairs, opened her bedroom door,
and the light switch.  still a clumsy son of a bitch," Sam said
apologetically.  He sat up in bed, rubbing his bruised face and black
eye Clare stared at the crisp black curls that covered his big c,host
and at the purple bruises inflicted on his arms by Matron Braddock.

Sit down a minute," Sam said sleepily.  He patted the patchwork
quilt.

As she perched on the side of the bed, Clare suddenly felt filled with
gratitude.

"Sam, I can't thank you enough.  Maybe we could have done it by
ourselves, but ... you 'made everything happen so fast.  You dealt with
that vile nursing home ... the lawyer ... the accountant ... the police
... the hospital ... You've been wonderful."  In the firelight, Sam
leaned forward and gently kissed the tip of her nose.  He put his arms
around her, pulled her against his chest, and started kissing her neck.
Softly he "said, "I have to get back to work the day after tomorrow."
Clare gently pulled away from him, feeling anything but gentle.  How
dare Sam press his advantage and try to seduce her!  And yet as she
felt indignation rise ... at the same time ... although her head was
telling her what to do, her bodyy was contradicting the message.

Sam leaned forward, kissed the space between her eyebrows, and
tightened his arms around her.  Slowly Clare stopped resisting.  As she
inhaled his familiar acrid odour and remembered the first time she had
been aware of his pungent eroticism, she felt as irresistibly drawn to
Sam as a pin to a magnet.  She remembered how secure.  she had felt
when first encircled by the powerful strength of these muscular,
bruised arms.  Even as she weakened, she was furious and bewildered.
Why didn't she feel this magnetism between herself and David, who was
so much better a man than Sam, so much more caring?  Why was she even
speaking to Sam when she knew how hurt David would be if he could see
her now?

At this very moment, David was probably collecting Josh from the church
hall at Warminster.  Tomorrow he was going to help Josh with the work
he'd missed, when he was late returning to school after their skiing
holiday.

Clare whispered, "I hate you, Sam, you manipulative bastard."

"Yes, baby," Sam murmured as he gently kissed her hairline.

"Let me go, you bastard," Clare hissed, trying to pull away from him.

Sam laughed and kissed her hard on the mouth.  Briefly, Clare tried to
remind herself of the way Sam had made her suffer during the past three
and a half years, but her memories faded as she felt again the dynamism
and protective strength that had first attracted her to him.  She
didn't want to be independent and sensible; she wanted to lay her head
on Sam's hard, hairy chest and feel his arms around her and know that
everything was going to be taken care of by him -just for a few
moments.

As her resolve melted and she yielded, somewhere at the back of her
head Clare realized that there was a kernel of truth in Elinor's world
of romance.

Later, as Sam slept, Clare lay awake watching the firefight flicker on
the ceiling.  She felt guilty, treacherous, and miserable.

Just half an hour earlier, after they had made love, she had whispered
to Sam, "Why do you really want me back?  Tell me the truth."  Sam had
hugged her hard against his big chest; his crisp, curly hair had
tickled her nose as he murmured, "Because I love you."  re knew that
the real reasons were not quite so e Sam missed his son, his wife, and
family lif n he had ever expected.  As a dog becomes accustomod to its
basket, Sam had grown used to having Clare around; she made him laugh,
she ran his home and his .SOCO life, she entertained his clients and
took care of all Wious; background trivialities of life; this left Sam
free .jo concentrate on the work he loved.

sighed.  Just now Sam had really tried his best.  But A- had felt as if
he was trying.  At one point, he had whis- .peted, "What more do I have
to do?  I've been hanging on the chandeliers trying to please you."

And Clare had whispered back, "That's exactly why it It going to work,
Sam.  Because I know you're trying, ",jmd so am I. But David and I
don't need to try."

"What the hell does he do that I don'tT Hesitantly Clare had tried to
explain, without hurting Sam.

"David accepts me the way I am the way my body and my mind work.  David
accepts my feelings, so I don't 'have to twist them to suit his
prejudices: he may feel differ but he isn't going to insist that I
agree."

"You mean he's better than me in the sack."

"That just shows you haven't been listening!"  Clare felt her
indignation grow.

"I left you because you didn't listen to me, Sam, and you never took me
seriously!  When I talked to you about something that was important to
me, you made the appropriate comments but I knew you weren't really
hearing me, because you carried on reading the paper or whatever.  That
told me that reading the paper was more important than what I had to
say!"  She sat up in bed.

"I felt you weren't really there, that you had removed yourself to
where I couldn't bother you."

"Are you telling me you walked out on me because I didn't listen to
you?"  in the firelight, Clare lifted her hands in a hopeless
gesture.

"Sam, you have a conveniently short memory.  I left you because I found
you in bed with a girl again."

"Sam started to lose his temper.  What was the point of bringing up all
that again?  And if Clare felt so strongly about it how come they were
in bed together?  He snapped, "You didn't miss anything.  I gave you
your orgasms, didn't I?  Could one quick fuck in the wrong cunt change
so much between us?"  Clare snapped back, "Promiscuity devalues the
coinage of love."  She was adamant.  She had learned the hard way that
a dishonest sexual relationship could alter a woman's entire life for
the worse, because one couldn't separate sex from the rest of
reality.

Suddenly Clare knew without a doubt which man she wanted to spend the
rest of her life with.  Certainly her conscience still told her to take
Josh back to his father and let Sam have another chance to prove
himself a good husband.  But she had already confronted the agonies of
conscience over depriving Josh of a father.  Why should she endure that
again?

And why should she risk going back to Sam?  Why should she risk this
new, happy life she had, struggled so hard to build up in the hope that
he would keep his promise, when he had broken so many promises before?
"I didn't mean that."  Sam groped for the words that would reach
Clare.

"Honey, I'm sorry."  Gently she shook his arm off.  She had made her
decision, and nothing was going to alter it.  Sam was still basically
selfish, and David was still basically the unselfish man who had
encouraged her to develop her own personality.  David was kind and
gentle, compassionate and thoughtful.  He was a considerate person, and
Sam was an inconsiderate person, which is why Sam was a bad lover.
Clare remembered that it was this quality in David that had quieted her
sexual anxiety.  And David's gentle consideration had also within her
that had made it difficult std on her own feet and solve her own s she
watched Sam sleep, Clare hoped to God a gist: David would be gentle,
compassionate, and under- stonding when she told him that she had just
been to bed WO Sam.  If 4U .. am o'clock that evening, Miranda heard
Buzz, in the ,ib9s only bathroom, singing tunelessly, "All the nice
Iftis love a sailor..."  She made a tray of tea and took it up to the
guest room.

Elinor was sitting in bed pouring Scrabble letters back into bag.

won!"  she said triumphantly, then looked anxious.  "You don't think
Buzz would cheat to let me win?"  "Never," lied Miranda as she poured
the tea.  She handed a cup to Elinor and said softly, "I have something
very important to ask you, Gran.  Who is Patricia Kettle?"  With a
trembling hand, Elinor slowly put down her cup.... she had some
secretarial job at the War Office."  She was clearly making an effort
to sound casual.

"She was killed in an air raid sometime in 1943, I think."

"I need to know more than that, darling."  Miranda's voice was gentle
but determined.  She pulled the crumpled birth certificate and Joe
Grant's letter from her pocket and handed both to Elinor.

Elinor looked at them sadly.

"After all these years .. she said.

"I suppose ... you'd better be told what happen cd  She looked down at
her cup of cooling tea, but what she saw was the front room of her home
in Earls Court Square, on Christmas Eve, 1941.

Elinor, wearing the dark green uniform of the Women's Voluntary
Service, switched off the wireless.  Cheerful news, for a change.  in
Washington, Churchill was deciding policy with Roosevelt, for after the
Japanese surprise attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbor, the
United States had entered the war.

In London, still under threat of German invasion, life seemed to
consist either of devastating air raids or of clearing up after them.
Like everyone else, Elinor did not get enough sleep, rarely ate a
proper meal, and often worked seven days a week, from dawn to long
after dark, for the unpaid WVS did any dirty work that seemed to be
nobody else's job: they had cared for the exhausted troops evacuated
from Dunkirk; they supervised evacuees; they housed and fed the
bombed-out; they dislocated their own lives to smooth those of other
people.

The O'Dares now lived, ate, and slept in the living room, which
arrangement minimized housework, and there was coal only for one fire.
On the right of the fireplace opposite the door stood the Morrison
shelter a table-height, fourposter double bed made of iron with metal
mesh sides.  Inside this shelter slept Clare, nearly three years old,
and Annabel, who was a year younger.  Elinor also slept in the
Morrison, and when there was a raid, Billy left his camp bed to join
them.

Objects tended to accumulate along the deep, flat top of the Morrison:
Elinor's sewing machine, the notes for her next home-nursing class, a
pile of mending, and, tonight, a small Christmas tree that Billy had
bought for an exorbitant sum in a pub, and a battered cardboard box.

As Elinor lifted the lid of the box, she smiled with disbelief.
Carefully she picked up the golden-haired china angel, with wings of
real feathers.

"Billy, look!  Nothing seems to be broken!"  The fragile gold and
silver balls, the folded, crinkly multicoloured paper bells, the
brightly coloured concertina paper chains, lay waiting to be used again
on the Christmas tree.

with Christmas decorations this year?"  Billy .4he worn
orange-flowered, armchair by the qte babies wont understand what
Christmas is all' bout  I'm not sure that I do.  Can't think why you
huo .9 up those stockings."  He jerked his head to the two "Other
stockings that dangled from the end of the Morrison.  stop being an old
bear," Elinor said cheerfully.

You're going to play Santa Claus tonight, just as you've always done
added winningly, "And you're the best-looking aa in London."  11 always
feel a complete fool," Billy grumbled, but he aniled at Elinor and
added, "I must admit, girl, you don't look too bad yourself, all things
considered.  After all, Marjorie is the same age as you, but her skin
looks like the Nile Delta."

Although she was past forty, Elinor's looks had worn -well and her
colouring had not faded.  Her creamy skin was her pink cheeks looked as
if she still lived in the 'country- her blue eyes sparkled; and her
hair still waved, 11oney gold.  Of course, her figure had thickened:
wartime meals were based on bread and potatoes.

The doorbell rang.  Automatically both adults looked to the window, but
the blackout curtains were drawn no chink of light was ho wing  So it
couldn't be an air-raid warden, about to complain.

Elinor kicked away the sandbag kept at the bottom of the door to cut
out draughts.  Shivering in the bitter chill of the hall passage
shegropedherwayto the front door.  "Who isiff "I'm a friend of
Billy's," said a woman's voice: it was too dark to see her.

"Come in quickly, out of the cold."  After shutting the door, Elinor
switched on the hall light and looked at her visitor, who cradled a
baby, wrapped in a blanket, in one arm, and carried a small, battered
suitcase with the other.

I Astonished, Elinor said, "I remember you!  Once I saw you speak to
my husband in a pub in Whitehall."

It had been on that day Annabel was born.  Elinor remembered the
distraught face of this girl and her slim-as-abullrush, brown-coated
figure.  She remembered the girl's almost visible aura of depression,
her pleading face, and the stooped shoulders that seemed to signal
dejection.  She remembered that the girl had laid her head on Billy's
sleeve.  He had roughly shaken her off.

"Who's that Billy, clutching the Daily Telegraph, opened the front-room
door.

"Pat!  What the hell are you doing he re?"  Billy backed into the room;
the woman followed him.  To Elinor, he seemed at once startled,
truculent, and nervous.

The girl looked at Billy, who wore a shabby knitted cardigan and carpet
slippers, no tie.  Wearily she said, "You don't look so much of a
ladykiller at home, Billy."  Her voice was devoid of expression and of
hope.

"I told you I'd bring her if you didn't turn up."  Turning to Elinor,
she said abruptly, "It's his."  She nodded her head towards the
blanket-wrapped bundle in her arms.

"How dare you come here!  How dare you make these ridiculous
accusations!"  Billy blustered.

"Shhhh!  You'll wake the girls!"  Elinor said automatically as her
heart shrivelled.

For years, Elinor had subconsciously dreaded just such a scene, had
known that Billy would be caught out one day.  She was surprised it
hadn't happened before.  She did not find it difficult to believe the
girl, and her words had the surreal inevitability of a scene d6ji vu,
although this tired young creature was not the tough, hard-bitten
predator Elinor had half expected to appear someday.

Standing in the middle of the room, still clutching the bundle, the
young woman started to cry in a soft, hopeless wait.

"I know Shorty told you I'd had the baby, Billy.  He in hospital
brought me two eggs.  Every day, I Id come yourself."  She burst into
fresh tears.

What the hell do you want?"  Billy asked roughly.  tj couldn't stay at
the hospital no longer, Billy.  I can't go baa to the hostel with a
baby.  I can't go home.  My dad vmdd kill me.  I don't know what to do.
Won't you come ."Vw look after us, Billy?  Remember all those times you
VromsedT y said, "You have no right to come here and cause trouble
between my wife and me."

At his formal tone of voice, the girl's face hardened.  She turned to
look at Elinor.

Elinor stared back.  The threadbare brown coat could disguise this
child's figure; she was clearly unaware of the aura of sexuality that
she so strongly projected, and that was probably what had attracted
Billy.  Elinor was ""irritatingly aware that her own green WVS uniform
made her look dumpy.

The girl said to Billy, "Why do you want to stay with iherT She jerked
her head towards Elinor.

With a nervous, shaking hand, Elinor pointed to the chimneypiece, upon
which stood two silver-framed photographs: Edward, aged seven, and
Edward and Jane on their wedding day.

She said, "Billy and I have been married for twenty-three years.  That
is Billy's son.  Billy's granddaughters are sleeping in this room.  We
are Billy's family, and he will never leave us."  Her voice rang with a
quiet confidence that she did not feel, although Elinor knew that Billy
depended on her strength, ability, and ingenuity to look after him in
wartime and still provide him with his home comforts: Billy liked to be
looked after; Billy did not want to find himself responsible for this
wilting woman-child and her helpless, dependent infant.

: "But you can't dump me!"  Pat Kettle pleaded.

"It's your job to look after us, Billy.  There's nobody else."  This
was a fatal error.  Billy took a hesitant step behind Elinor.

"You can't pretend we don't exist!"  Miss Kettle wailed.  The baby in
her arms started to cry.

"Tell me what to do, Billy!  I can't look after a baby and earn my
living at the same time!"  She looked beseechingly at Billy.

"It's your baby whatever you like to think.  You know I've never been
with another man!  I love you, Billy!"  She appealed to Elinor.

"It's his baby as much as mine!  Why should I have all the
responsibility?  He's got a home and someone to look after it I
haven't."  Raising his voice above the baby's yells, Billy said, "I'm
not admitting it's mine."  He turned to Elinor.

"I admit ... Well, you saw for yourself that she threw herself at me.
But it only happened a couple of times.  And it ... was never anything
serious.  And if it hadn't been for her bloody stupid religion, she
could have taken precautions!  That was her responsibility!"

At this point, the noise woke Annabel, who started to cry.  Clare woke
up and bawled in sympathy.  Billy clapped his hands over his ears and
turned away from the two women, towards the window.

Almost incredulous, the girl stared at his rejecting back.

"Well, I can't cope any longer," she said, and laid the blanket-wrapped
baby on top of the Morrison shelter.  Then, sobbing, she hurried from
the room.

A small, clenched fist thrust up from the wailing, jerking bundle,
which rolled towards the edge of the Morrison.

As Elinor jumped forward to stop the baby from falling to the floor,
she heard the front door bang.

Defensively Billy said, "Stupid bitch."  To break the angry silence, he
turned on the wireless.  The Andrews Sisters sang cheerfully about the
Boogie-Woogie Bugler Boy from Company B. vw.  baby in one arm, Elinor
switched off the wireWFiliiWslared at Billy.

"There's some dried milk in the brr.  "Make me a jugful.  Quickly. This
baby is hungry."  She would pretend that this baby was Edward and
Jane's third, daughter; a six-week baby couldn't be passed off as a
tWjnonth baby, but her new birth date would have to be bob, re Jane's
death.  So Elinor would have to keep this infant away from the
neighbours for a bit; then she would say that the baby had been born
prematurely, had been tiny at birth and was still small for her age,
and had been kept in hospital for months ... Luckily, Annabel and Clare
were too young to remember anything strange about the arrival of this
sister ... It would be easy to pretend.

"What happened to ... my mother?"  Miranda whispered.

"I never saw Mi 'ss Kettle again," Elinor said apologetically.

"I've no idea whether Billy still carried on with her after that.  I
doubt she'd have let him.  We never spoke of it again.

"She abandoned me.  My mother abandoned me," Miranda said with
disbelief.

"She was very young and clearly at the end of her tether.  Be
generous," Elinor said.

"NoV Miranda's voice was almost a shriek; her face was ashen white.

"Please, I don't want this.  I want my sisters and I want you to be ...
I love you, Gran!  I want to be part of your family.  You're the one
who has always looked after me, the one I've always loved!"

"So you are," Elinor said firmly.  She held out her frail arms and
pulled Miranda against her.

"Some people are born into a family and some people are chosen.  I
chose you long ago, Miranda, and I love you every bit as much as I love
Annabel and Clare."  She stroked Miranda's hair.

"They are your sisters, and I trust you never to tell them
otherwise."

"But then I'll be lying to Clare and Annabel," Miranda cried.

"I can't look them in the eyes and know that I'm hiding something so
important from them!"  She stepped back from Elinor.

"I'm not going to lie to them," she said.

"I'm not going to deceive them.  And I'm not going to lie to mysetR
Then I really won't know who I am!"  She started to sob.

"How can I behave normally, as a sister, if I know I'm lying to them
all the time?  ... You've always been able to shut your eyes to what
you don't want to see, or put on your rose-coloured spectacles.  so
that you only see what suits you in life.  But I want to face up to
life, and deal with what's unpleasant, rather than hide or ignore it. I
can't live with the people I love, knowing that I'm acting a lie all
the time deceiving them.  I can't do that!  I could never behave
naturally with them and I would have no peace of mind I couldn't stand
it.  It would always be on my conscience."

"Please, darling," Elinor implored, "you've always been impetuous as
well as straightforward.  This time please listen to me.  Annabel and
Clare were too young to know.  If I deceived you and your sisters, it
was because I love you all very much, and I love you all the same. It's
often thought best not to let an orphan know she's adopted, but to
raise her as one of the family; that is what I did with you."

"But Gran, you can't imagine how I feel.  It's as though someone had
suddenly pushed me over a cliff, and I'm falling into a void.  I feel
rootless.  My life is never going to be the same again.  I don't belong
anywhere .. ."

"Nonsense.  You belong with us, as you always have."  Elinor's thin
hand stroked Miranda's arm.

"Because although this sounds important it isn't.  It doesn't change
anything: you're still an O'Dare still one of the family ... our
family.  What happened was upsetting for me at the time, but if it
hadn't happened, then I wouldn't have had my third granddaughter so I'm
glad it did!"

bit her lower lip.

"Nevertheless, I can't keep a like this from my ... from Clare and
Annabel."

"s a difference between being dishonest and being W Elinor said.

"Everyone is morally entitled to guard their privacy to protect
themselves; everyone does that, all the time.  Nobody blabs their
secrets to the world.  Some- times discretion and I refuse to call it
dishonesty" is thee, best policy."  "But they're not "the world"I
They're ... my sisters ... jiVd I want them to know the truth." Then I
would prefer that you didn't tell them yet.  I don't want them to be
distressed on your behalf- we've had enough upsets recently in this
family.  Besides, there's nothing to be gained by telling them the
truth.  Not now."  Miranda stared at her.

"How can you judge that?  You, who always ran from the truth if it
didn't suit you!  You, who lied in so many ways by omission, by
insinuation.  Gran, you lied to everyone, most especially to yourself..
Why did you do it?"

Elinor paused before she spoke again; the pain was evident in her
voice.

"Why does anyone lie?  Fear.  I was afraid of violence, afraid of the
deeper unhappiness perhaps despair that I would feel if I had to admit
to myself that my life was unhappy; I was afraid of having to face the
world alone every woman's fear and of being unable to cope.  I'm afraid
I'm not very brave, Miranda."  Miranda said nothing; her face reflected
mute confusion.  Elinor pressed her argument persuasively: "Miranda,
you can't see this thing objectively right now nobody in your position
could.  So please promise me that you won't say anything to anyone
yet."

"Gran, Gran, how can I let you decide anything about this?  You're as
subjective as I am.  How can I trustyourjudgement?"

"I'm only asking you to give yourself time, to think more calmly about
the matter."

I After reflection, Miranda nodded her head slowly.

"All right.  I'll agree to that."

"And should you eventually decide that they should be told, then let me
tell them .. ."  Elinor persisted.

"Okay," Miranda responded wearily.

"And let me choose the time and the place to tell them.  Just promise
me that, darling."  With great reluctance, Miranda said, "Yes, if
that's what you want."  Elinor sighed with relief.  She had managed to
postpone this unhappy matter, but what was more important was that she
had managed quickly to persuade Miranda that this hurtful revelation
was of no consequence and that was certainly true.

Miranda threw her head back and stared unhappily at her grandmother.

"There's another thing I also feel ashamed about.  All my life I've
howled for my fair share of whatever was going I felt it was my moral
right.  I felt cheated when I was left out of something because I was
the youngest.  I even insisted that I was morally entitled to inherit
one third of all your money.  I always made a point of that!  And now I
realize I'm not entitled to a single penny!  Adam knew that.  Why else
would he have my birth certificate?  It gave him proof I wasn't
entitled to any of the Dove Trust.  Oh, Gran, I've been such a greedy
little bitch!  How could you stand meT "Hush, darling.  I don't want to
hear any more of this nonsense.  The youngest child often feels left
out, and I always understood how you felt.  All any child is entitled
to is a good education and perhaps a start in life, and luckily I was
able to give you that.  As to the rest ... Who knows whether I'm going
to have any money to leave anybody?  But we're none of us going to be
homeless and starving.  And anyway, that's not what matters right now."
She tightened her arms around Miranda, and Miranda felt like a little
girl again, being comforted in Elinor's arms.  Elinor slowly said,
"Perhaps I also need that peace of which you spoke."

CHAPTER 32

SATURDAY, I FEBRUARY 1969

Mike wore his black leathers with the jacket unzipped; he stood, legs
astride, before the pine log fire in Adam's study.  His face was white,
and his clear, wide-apart grey eyes reflected his fury and his
horror.

Adam brandished the Evening Standard.  ""Society beauty loses eye'T he
shouted.

"I told you to scare her not half kill her!  You can't hush up this
sort of thing, you know!"

"I'm just as worried as you are.  How do you suppose I fee lT Mike had
rarely seen his brother so angry.  Badtempered, yes, but not this
towering fury.  Unlike Mike, whose self-control could easily snap if he
was sufficiently provoked, Adam usually kept his feelings under tight
control.

"How the hell did it happen?"

"These people aren't always controllable you know that, Adam!  One of
the reasons they do it is because they enjoy it.  They don't want to
stop."

Adam roared, "You didn't even get my notebooks back!"

"There were no notebooks in Annabel's purse, just the usual junk," Mike
again insisted.

"Her clothes were searched as well they found nothing."

Adam didn't bother to mention that the notebooks were upstairs in his
desk, as usual.  He felt chagrined that he hadn't checked on them
before having Annabel beaten up.  He had a sudden thought.

"I'd better make sure that Elinor doesn't find out about this!  Of
course she doesn't read the papers, but there's a TV stuck in front of
her bloody bed!  It could mean trouble!"  As he spoke, he snatched up
the telephone and dialled the long-distance operator.

connected, Adam brusquely addressed the recep- "flAt Mafrnn R-AA 1AIM-+
A 0 o you rnean, resigned?  ... Then give me Dr.  Craig-Dunlop!"  The
receptionist stammered, "Dr.  Craig-Dunlop is cruising in the
Caribbean, on his winter vacation."

"When will he return?"  Adam's voice was harsh.

or Craig-Dunlop has already left the cruise ship," qmvered the
receptionist.

"He's flying back to Britain as as he can.  I'll telephone your office
as soon as he Grant."  am could have kicked himself.  He should have
checked Elinor every single goddamn day.  Why hadn't the or told him
that he was going on a cruise?  Why hadn't someone told him that the
matron was leaving?  My God, "'if you wanted anything done, you had to
do it yourself.  I Sharply he asked, "And in the meantime, who is in
charge of the nursing home?  ... Then tell the assistant matron that I
want to speak to her immediately ... To discuss one of her patients, of
course ... Mrs.  O'Dare."

The receptionist stammered, "We have strict instructions not to talk
about Mrs.  O'Dare."

Adam was almost speechless with anger.

"I am Mrs.  O'Dare's lawyer!"  His voice dropped as, carefully, he
asked,.

"Is Mrs.  O'Dare dead?"

There was a long pause.

"Well, is she or isn't she?"  Adam growled, his anxiety once more
surfacing.

"No.  Mrs.  O'Dare hasn't passed away," said the receptionist
reluctantly.

"But I can't tell you more than that."  Clearly there was a lot more to
be told.  Something odd was happening at the Lord Willington, and Adam
was sure he would get more information from this stupid bitch at the
desk than from the assistant matron.  He barked, "I'm coming down to
Eastbourne immediately unless you tell me what's happened to Mrs.
O'Dare."

The terrified receptionist didn't want this bullying lawyer yelling at
her in person.  She blurted out, "That wouldn't do any good Mrs.
O'Dare's no longer here!"

"What do you mean, she isn't there?"

Adam bellowed.

Prudently the receptionist pulled the line from the switchboard.

Adam turned to Mike.

"I've been cut off.  Deliberately, I suspect.  I wonder what the hell
is happening."  Mike was astonished by the speed with which his
brother's interest had switched from the frightening problem of
Annabel's injuries to trouble at Elinor's nursing home.  Why should it
matter so much to Adam where Elinor was?  And it was obvious that Adam
had hoped she was dead.  Why?

The answer had to be money, Mike figured.  He'd probably rigged her
will something like that.  What a coldblooded bastard his brother
was.

Adam tapped a finger against his teeth as he considered what to do.  He
decided, "I'd better get down to the nursing home and check what's
happened."  He looked at his watch.

"Six o'clock."  Snatching up the telephone, he said, "The quickest way
to Eastbourne is by train.  When's the next express?"  Having gained
this information, Adam turned to Mike.

"You can take me to Victoria Station on your bike!"  he ordered.

"The next train leaves in fifteen minutes, so get going, you lazy
bastard!"

Mike stared, surprised.  Normally Adam would never deign to ride a
motorbike.  He didn't understand why Mike chose to drive a bike like a
greaser when he had a perfectly good new E-Type that could go far
faster than all his two-wheeled monsters.  Adam didn't seem to realize
that a motorbike was no longer a poor man's transport method: bikes
were dangerous and exciting.  A man who rode a bike was a man ready for
action.  And even the most oxpwsive Ferrari was a vanishing dot in the
rearview jiliroir of a fast bike.

But apparently Adam did realize that, during the rush hour, nty
transport was faster for weaving in and out of London traffic than a
motorbike.

"Come on!"  Adam urged brusquely, hurrying towards the door.  In the
hall, he pulled on his overcoat and waited impatiently as Mike buckled
his German officer's black leather trench coat liberated from the
original owner by their uncle, in Munich, in 1945.

"Hurry!"  Adam snapped.

Both brothers clattered down the back stairs rather than wait for the
slow, wheezing elevator.  As he did so, Mike fastened his helmet strap
and pulled on his leather gloves: if he came off, he preferred to
sacrifice the leather and not his skin.

Outside, it was already dark.  The weak morning sunshine had dissolved
the slush, and the roads were now dry.

"For Christ's sake, get moving!"  Adam snarled.

The bike didn't start at Mike's first kick.

"Mike the Bike!"  Adam jeered.  Even Adam knew that only legendary
racer Mike Hailwood was known as Mike the Bike.  He also knew that his
brother didn't like to be teased a bout his bikes.  Mike, on edge after
hearing the bad news about Annabel, turned his head and said, "Don't
take your bloody bad temper out on me!"

"I'll say whatever I bloody well like to you, and you'll bloody well do
whatever I tell you to do!"

Adam yelled.

As always, Mike was bewildered by Adam's abrupt change of mood.  He
understood the hard shell into which Adam retreated when the world
became too threatening: he also understood the depth of feeling in Adam
that lay hidden from the rest of the world.  But Mike never understood
why his brother always chose to vent his vile moods on him of all
people.

Mike kicked the starter again.  The bike merely coughed.

"Why doesn't this fucking machine work?"  Adam screamed.  He kicked the
side panel.  I "Don't kick my bike," Mike growled.  After years of
being at Adam's mercy, being humiliated by him, being the recipient of
his bad-tempered kicks and snarls, Mike was finally pushed to violent
action.  He decided it was time that Adam stopped treating him like a
dog.  It was time more than time that he taught Adam a lesson.  He
would show him that he wasn't always in the superior position.  For
once, Mike would be in control.  He was going to give Adam the fright
of his life.

The black Egli Vincent with the nickel-plated frame started on the
third kick.  Listening to the thundering noise from the throbbing 1,000
cc V twin, Mike smiled to himself.  The Vincent engine was tuned to
Black Lightning Specification, capable of doing a hundred and forty
miles an hour.

Mike turned from Cadogan Place, then left on to Pont Street.  With a
roar, the bike shot ahead into Belgrave Square, a central garden
encircled by cream, classical buildings.

"Hey!"  Half deafened by the noise from the exhaust, Adam yelled over
Mike's shoulder.

"This is a one-way street!  You just turned the wrong way!"

Mike smiled.  He knew that at this time of night, there was never much
traffic in Belgrave Square.

The Egli tore at increasing speed around the black-spiked railings that
surrounded the central garden.

"What the fuck do you think you're iloing?"  Adam screamed into the
wind.

His brother's terrified reaction made Mike grin.  The euphoria went
right to his head, like a glass of fizzing champagne on an empty
stomach.  His bike throbbed beneath him, leaping ahead.  "The harsh
wind on Adam's face forced tears from the of his eyes.  The buildings
were leaning out at' him  No, the bike was leaning in.  He felt dizzy
and frightened.  As the Egli swerved to avoid a sedate limousine, Adam
screamed, and his arms tightened around Mike's waist.

Mike laughed.  He could still hear an enraged horn behind them as, with
a thunder of exhaust, he slid out of Bclgrave Square.  He knew it
seemed to Adam that he was handling the -Egli with violence even
savagery; Adam probably thought that he wasn't completely in charge of
his machine, though Mike knew that he was.

Leaving the square, Mike should have turned right, towards Victoria
Station.  Instead, he turned left.

"This isn't the way to Victoria Station!  Where the fuck do you think
you're going?"  The wind flung Adam's words back into his mouth.

At this point, Adam seriously considered throwing himself from the
Egli, but that would be even more dangerous, with all the traffic, on
this dark night, than clinging to his brother.

As the bike picked up speed, Mike felt increasingly exhilarated.  Adam,
who never spared a thought for other people, now knew what it felt like
to be at someone else's mercy, to endure violence, to be terrified.

Ahead of the Egli loomed a high triumphal arch with elaborate gates.
Mike headed towards these closed gates, as if to smash straight into
them.

Adam screamed.  At the last minute, the Egli swerved.  Now, to Adam's
left, shadowed trees threatened him from beneath old-fashioned
lamplight; to his right loomed the spike-topped walls of Buckingham
Palace.

"Lean in with me!"  Mike yelled over his shoulder.

The Egli started to slalom.  In terrifying fashion, the gleaming
monster wove in and out of the moving vehicles.

The shrieks of protesting horns could be heard even above the howl of
the bike.  Adam ducked his head behind Mike's body and clung to him,
concentrating simply on staying alive and thinking only from one moment
to the next.

With a powerful roar, the bike zoomed around the statue in front of
Buckingham Palace and up the Mall, where Mike took the Egli up to
maximum speed.

Adam's cheeks were forcibly drawn back, and his breath torn from his
mouth.  The crenellated walls of St.  James's Palace blurred past on
his left.  In front of the Egli, traffic lights were red.

Mike did not reduce speed.  Adam shut his eyes.  Just as the Egli
reached the lights, they switched to amber.  The Egli roared on, at
full throttle.

Adam, surprised to find himself still alive, opened his eyes to see,
ahead, the stately grey curve of Admiralty Arch.

With a squeal of tyres, Mike viciously decelerated, turning into
Trafalgar Square.  Briefly the Egli's front wheel left the ground.

Adam's brain began functioning again as the bike slowed down.

"What do I have to do to get you to stop?  What do you want?"  he
yelled to a background cacophony of loud bangs as the engine backfired
on the overrun, and flames flashed from the exhaust.

Mike swung the bike to the right, calling over his shoulder, "Ten per
cent of what you're getting from the Dove Trust.  "

"Bugger that!"  yelled Adam.

"NoP Mike grinned.  So he had guessed correctly.  Adam was milking the
trust.  He flicked his wrist and the speed increased.

They were circling Trafalgar Square now.  In the square, the base of
Nelson's Column was guarded by four enor bronze lions in a semicircle
of iron posts.  Behind this ols, their fountains of bronze -mermaids
and 0 POns floodlit from below.  Naturally, no tourists or
slick-selling touts were hanging about after dark in the cold, but
there was plenty of traffic around the square.  The Egli thundered past
weary, red double-decker buses and liquorice-black taxis.

Adam again wondered whether it was more dangerous to stay on the bike
or hurl himself off.  He half decided to throw himself off, knowing
that Mike would have to slow down when he turned right if he turned
right at the top of the square.

But as the Egli climbed uphill towards the top, Adam saw the row of
posts that protected the stone steps leading down into the square; to
hit one of those iron guards with his head would mean a funeral
march.

He decided to hang on tight and remember what a good driver Mike was
although it was no use thinking that Mike wouldn't put himself at risk,
because a biker did that all the time.

Mike swerved to the right.  The Egli dodged between two posts.

Adam beyond screaming gurgled hoarsely as the motorbike slithered down
the shallow steps to the square.

A crowd of pigeons fluttered into the air as the Egli bounced from the
steps, then passed the ornamental pools, thundered past the dark,
crouching lions, and bumped on to the road again.

Again Mike flicked the bike to the right.  Dear God, Adam thought. He's
going to do that nightmare stunt again!  He leaned forward and yelled
into Mike's ear, "All right!  Ten percent.  You win!"

Mike grinned into the wind.  He knew Adam wouldn't give him a penny,
but Mike wasn't serious about the money.  He didn't want it.  What he
wanted was to be in control and have Adam begging for mercy -just
once.

"You're sure you really want to give me ten per cent?"  Mike teased
over his shoulder as the Egli again circled the square.

"Yes!"

Sur eT "Yes!  Yes!"

"I don't believe you!"  Mike's laugh was torn by the wind.  He was
really enjoying this ride.

As the Egli tore past the top of the square for the second time, it
continued straight ahead.  Like a howling black and silver bullet, the
motorbike shot past the policeman at the traffic lights.  Then Mike
turned left, into the Strand..  On Adam's right shone the lights of
Charing Cross Station.  The bike's acceleration made him feel nauseous.
He hoped he wouldn't vomit... Hell, what did it matter if he did?  The
first set of lights were green.  The second set of lights were green.
Adam's heart thudded against his chest as the Egli thundered towards
the third set of traffic lights, where the road was divided by central
iron railings.

The third set of lights were green.  As the bike charged on, Adam
ducked his head and glimpsed the silvery metal portico of the Savoy
Hotel.  Top-hatted porters in green uniform stood before revolving
doors.

Mike slammed the bike to the left, curved around the island of the
Aldwych, then drove back towards the Savoy.

At this point, the downpour that had been threatening all afternoon
suddenly started.  Mike immediately slowed down.

Adam, relieved, hunched his back, but couldn't prevent the rain from
streaming down the back of his neck.  He let go with one hand to turn
up his coat d kill Mike when he finally stopped!  ey approached the
brilliantly lit cul-de-sac where the Savoy Hotel stood, the traffic
lights changed to green, which allowed the Egli right of way.

Not noticing that the lights had changed, a majestic maroon Bentley
slowly drew out of the cul-de-sac on to the main road..  Mike hurriedly
swerved to the right to avoid the tank.  tough Bentley.  He then
swerved again to avoid the central line of iron railings that divided
the road.

in front of the Egli, an Italian businessman had just paid his taxi
fare.  Without looking, from force of habit he mistakenly opened the
right-hand passenger door.

The Egli charged into the open door of the taxi.  The door ripped from
its hinges.  The plump Italian was Rung back into the interior of the
cab, with a broken thumb.  Mike and Adam were hurled into the air over
the door of the taxi.

Head-on, Adam crashed into an ornate pale blue lamppost.  He was thrown
backwards on to the pavement.

The Egli slid down the Strand on its left side, the footrest and
handlebars raising a shower of sparks from the road.

After that, nothing seemed to happen for a long time.  Mike lay on his
back in the road, between the cab and his bike.  As he tried to sit up,
pain shot through his left arm and leg, and he fell back.  He clapped
his right arm to his left and touched shredded flesh and sticky blood:
the arm of the jacket had been ripped off.  He fumbled for his left
thigh and felt the shredded remains of his trouser leg.  But his
kneecap was still there.  He tried again, unsuccessfully, to bend his
knee.

Slowly Mike lifted his head and looked around.  The Egli lay on its
left side, wheels still spinning.

"Shit!"  At least his broken leg would mend, but he realized that his
irreplaceable bike was a write-off.

As rain streamed down on him, he painfully pulled himself up on his
right elbow.  Where was Adam?  He twisted his body to the right so that
he could see behind him.

About seven feet behind, Adam lay, inert, on the road.  In spite of the
rain, passers-by with coat collars turned up gathered on the pavement.
A woman screamed, "Someone get the police!"  A man in black bowler hat
and fashionable overcoat hurried towards Mike, who was now crawling
down the middle of the road.

Mike shook his head to the offer of help; with gritted teeth, he inched
his way towards his brother.  Soon he was near enough to see that the
top of Adam's head was missing and his neck lolled at an odd angle.
Blood and dark splotches of brain splattered the pavement.

With hoarse groans, Mike started to cry.  A policeman came up to him
and draped his black rain cape over Mike, but Mike shook it off.  When
the ambulance arrived, he was huddled by the side of the road, hugging
Adam in his arms and rocking him back and forth.  Tears ran down his
filthy, bloodied, torn face.

The two paramedics gently pried Mike's arms away from Adam's body.  One
said, "It's all right, mate, we'll look after him now."

"Be careful of him," Mike said through sobs.

"He's my brother."

"Course we will, mate.  Leave him to us."  Rain slashed down as the two
paramedics slid Adam on to the stretcher.  As they lifted him, his left
arm flopped over the side, and Mike glimpsed a gleam of gold.

"His watch!  I'd better look after his watch for him," he said.  Adam
was fond of that watch for some reason.  He'd never forgive Mike if
someone nicked it on the way to the hospital.

The paramedics glanced at each other.  The poor sod couldn't accept
that his brother was a goner.  The policeman the Omega watch, replaced
Adam's arm on the and handed the watch down to Mike.

"They'll be back for you, sir," he said.  Once again he covered Mike
with his black rain cape.

A4ike glanced at the watch and turned it over.  In the light of the
streetlamp that had killed his brother he noticed five lines of figures
engraved on the back of it.

JNlike felt sick; then he felt faint.  He put the watch down beside him
on the stone kerb and flopped on the pavement, Ife still hoped that
this scene was as unreal as it seemed to him.  He still hoped that he
would have the chance to tell Adam how sorry he was for trying to
frighten him.

When the paramedics returned to load Mike on to the stretcher, he
forgot about the watch.  It lay under the lamplight, on the
blood-streaked kerb stone and the raindrops fell softly upon it.

CHAPTER 33

TUESDAY, I APRIL 1969

"Darling Gran, may I phone you back?"  Miranda looked at the pile of
folders on her desk.

"I have a directors" meeting in ten minutes, and Adam left so much to
straighten o as if I hadn't enough work!"

"I hope you're allowing enough time for the wedding preparations,"
Elinor reminded her anxiously.

"Oh, Angus is organizing our wedding.  I'm not allowed to do a thing.
He won't even tell me where we're going on our honeymoon.  Even the
doctor who gave me my shots wouldn't tell me.  Just smiled as he said,
"This one's anti cholera you can't be too careful in Brighton.""

"I can't help wishing that you and Clare were having a double
wedding."

"You know Clare and David would hate a grand wedding.  And besides,
you're only allowed your first wedding in church."  Miranda glanced at
her watch.

"Darling, can't this wait until I see you on Saturday?"

"I had the feeling that you might be so busy you'd cancel Saturday. I'm
really just calling to make sure you don't."

"I must admit I thought of it.  I reckon I could almost catch up, given
an uninterrupted working weekend."

"Not this weekend," Elinor said firmly.

"You promised to drive Annabel down here, and it's the last time we'll
all be together for goodness knows how long.  Scott arrives on Monday
to take her for her final check-up at St.  George's, and then they're
both flying back to New York."

"Well, if you insist," Miranda said reluctantly, "I will be there."
-Miranda," Elinor said.

"This is important.  I have to tell you all, something I should have
told you a rather special story."  It's a story .. Arling, you've been
telling stories for forty2 11 know," Elinor's quiet voice interrupted,
"but this is my and I can't live alone with it any longer."  A touch of
Wuthering Heights, Miranda thought" sighin "I may be the first bride to
walk down the aisle of St.  Margaret's, Westminster, with a briefcase
in her hand, but of course I'll come if it's important to you."

SATURDAY, 5 APRIL 1969

""Only another five minutes," Miranda said as she swung the Reliant
Scimitar off the main road towards Clare's cottage."  She added, "Now
remember, Annabel, in front of Gran, you don't mind wearing that eye
patch."  - "Of course not.  I adore wearing the goddamn thing.  It
gives me an air of mystery, like the man in the Hathaway shirt ads."
Annabel paused.

"Actually, you know, I do rather like the eye patch because it reminds
me that I'm not as I was before.  Oh, I know the plastic surgeon has
promised me the scars will go away, and I know the glass eye will look
every bit as natural as the one I lost, but in an odd way, that mugging
freed me.  It's freed me to be myself and I'm only just starting to
find out who I am, because up to now I've hidden behind an eight-by-ten
glossy print.  And you know what?  So far my real self has been quite a
surprise to me."

"We're all proud of the new, grown-up Annabel especially Gran."

"She certainly seems back to normal tough as old boots."

"Buzz says she wakes up happy every morning, just because she's not in
that grim nursing home."

"I still don't understand why she won't sue that awful doctor,"
Annabel said.

"Craig-Dunlop is bound to have covered himself lega ly, and it would
just drag on and on in the courts, as Mr.  Owen told us," Miranda
reminded her.

"It's much better for Gran to try and forget the whole thing, and look
forward to something pleasant.  She and Buzz are planning a trip to the
south of France.  They want to find a small farmhouse, where they can
start a new life and put this behind them."

"Oh, I wish we all could."  Annabel sighed.

"There are just so many unanswered questions.  I suppose Adam's watch
hasn't turned up yet?"  "No.  One of the ambulance paramedics remembers
a policeman unstrapping it from Adam's wrist and handing it to Mike,
but since then there's been no sign of it.  Mike probably dropped it on
the street, which means anything could have happened to it.  Someone
may have walked off with it, or it might have been destroyed, in which
case some Swiss bank will hang on to all that money!  I can't bear to
think of it!"

"I don't understand why our lawyers are offering that huge reward,
especially since nobody's even certain that those bank account numbers
were engraved on the back of the watch.  It's only guesswork by
Angus."

"I'd bet on it.  Those numbers must be written down somewhere, Miranda
said.

"The detectives found nothing in Adam's home or office.  Besides, it
really is more than guesswork by Angus.  He says that those numbers
have to be written down somewhere.  Some people engrave them on the
backs of signet rings, or maybe inside a pocket watch.  We've checked
all of Adam's jewellery and found nothing.  No, it must be that watch;
he was always so protective of it.  And who knows?  Maybe it'll turn
up."

"I suppose we should be grateful that Adam didn't get all Gran's
money," Annabel said ruefully.

No, there's still about seventeen per cent left in the trust -a little
over one and a half million pounds," Miranda replied.

"Plus, the lawyers think the trust will be awarded all of Adam's shares
in SUPPLY KITS in lieu of the money he so clearly stole: the trust will
then own forty-six per cent of the company, which is worth about two
and a half million pounds.  Plus, the royalties on Gran's novels keep
coming in, so there really is plenty.  In American dollars, what's left
in the trust should total at least ten million."

"That's all well and good," said Annabel, "but I still don't understand
why the trust wasn't protected, when we were told it was insured for
millions."

"Because Adam was careful to do nothing overtly illegal," Miranda
explained, yet again.

"His taking money from the trust and squirrel ling it away in some
secret place was obviously not Gran's intent, but the fact remains that
she gave him her' power of attorney, a document that virtually said, "I
hereby authorize Adam Grant to do anything he likes with everything I
own.""

"I wonder whether Adam would have been able to get away with it if he'd
been dealing with men, not women," Annabel mused.

"Probably not," Miranda said.

"God knows men aren't any smarter, but most of them are brought up to
be self reliant to look after themselves more, and not to always be so
dependent ... and trusting."

After lunch, when Josh had gone out to play, Elinor looked at the
expectant faces around the table and knew that there would never be a
better moment to tell them.

Quietly, she related the truth of Miranda's parentage.

"The dirty dog," Buzz said.  Clare looked at Miranda's wary face and
slowly said, "It doesn't alter anything between us, you know."

Annabel added, "Of course not."  Then they all started talking at
once.  Everyone hugged Miranda.

Eventually, Elinor said, "At first I didn't want you to know about this
... unpleasantness, but Miranda insisted, and when she did I realized
there was something else you had to be told."  She took a deep
breath.

"You all think I don't want to talk about what happened with Adam but I
do.  All my life, I've allowed myself to ignore the lessons I should
have learned and to forget the ones I should have remembered.  Well,
not this time!  I can't.  I can't go on pretending that bad things
don't happen, that the happy ending will always come along.  Not after
this.  Not after I've seen my family almost destroyed.  All because I
couldn't deal with reality and always, always refused to face
unpleasant facts.  I now see that if, ostrich-like, you pretend not to
see your own problems, then you can't solve them."

An astonished silence greeted this firm speech: Elinor had clearly
regained her old strength.

"Don't be too hard on yourself, Gran," Annabel said.

"We've survived."

"Only just!  You and I could have been killed!  I almost lost my
reason, not to mention most of my money.  Your money.  Miranda lost
control of her business.  Buzz found herself with no home and no
income.  And Clare was almost lost to me for ever.  How did I let that
happen?"

"Don't blame yourself, Nell," Buzz said.

"Nobody noticed what was happening because Adam was a con man, and
nobody spots a successful con man until it's too late.  And he was very
good he could have fooled anyone."  Elinor slowly shook her head.

"I mustn't hide behind excuses.  Not this time, and not ever again.  I
could have stopped all this before it, started, and I know why I
didn't.

Everyone stared at Elinor.

see I didn't trust myself to handle my own prob explained

"If any man said, "This isn't the sort.  g that a woman understands,"
then I immediately decided that I didn't understand it, and let him
handle it."  Gently Clare said, "Gran, I'm so pleased that you can
finally admit this."  11 always expected a man to look after me,"
Elinor went on.

"I always believed that a man would know best.  Now I Jmow how wrong I
was, and I regret it.  It's harmed all of you."  "Nonsense, darling!"
Annabel cried.

"You've never hurt us.  And you've always given us everything we
needed."  Elinor looked around the table.

"Yes, everything.  Except the truth.  That's why Annabel and Miranda
expected a perfect Prince Charming.  I now realize that happiness is
not hoping for protection by an illusory, perfect man, but in
discovering the surprising strength of one's imperfect self that inner
core, the "real me" that every woman senses.  Only Clare always said I
confused romance with reality.  When she fought me, I was determined
not to let her win ... I couldn't let her win, because losing would
mean tearing down the facade that I'd carefully erected to conceal the
truth of my life most especially from myself because my reality was so
painful."

"Surely not after Daddy Billy died?"  Annabel asked.

"Especially after Billy died."  Elinor paused, then continued quietly:
"It's time I also told you the truth about Billy's death, time I
stopped remembering a fake life and started to live a real one ... in
the real world."  Elinor paused again.  She knew it would take all her
ability as a storyteller and all her strength as a survivor to tell
this, her most difficult story, because she had lived the he for so
long that she had almost come to believe it.  But now the truth had to
be told without sentiment, without romance.

"on.  the day Billy died," Elinor began, "I'd visited my publishers in
London.  They'd called me there for press interviews, but there was
also another reason they wanted to see me.  When I arrived at their
office, I found that Joe Grant was also there.  Unsavoury stories were
being spread, stories that threatened my good name and ultimately
threatened my growing success as a writer.  Apparently, they were being
spread by Billy silly rumours to get him attention and sympathy rather
than harming me.  For the most part, no one had paid attention to
them.

"However, the latest story was not so easily dismissed.  It didn't come
from Billy, but it involved him, and it was ugly.  It seems he had
bothered a young girl ... No, that's not quite it."  She hesitated,
determined to tell the story straight.

"It seems he had molested a young girl, or at least attempted to do so.
Apparently Billy offered to photograph her, then tried to take off her
clothes.  Afterwards,.  when the girl made trouble and threatened to
contact me through my publisher, Billy confessed to Joe Grant, who
tried to hush up the situation; he decided I had better be warned.  In
fact I already knew.  Maybe not about this one, but there had been
others.  I had even once confronted Billy.  He denied it, of course.
And of course I tried hard to believe him."  In the silence of her
kitchen, Clare said, "Gran, does that matter now?  It all happened so
long ago .. ."

"It mattered then," Elinor said, "because I knew I would have to speak
to Billy about it.  I had to make him realize, his danger the danger
for all of us.  But in order to do that, he would have to admit his
folly to me, and to himself.  I knew it would be almost impossible, but
I had to try.  I was too depressed to talk to him when I got back from
London that evening, and anyway, he wasn't home when I returned,
exhausted, at ten an hour before the pubs closed.  Neither was Buzz."
She looked at her friend.

"Remember, you were spending your summer holiday with us $Wfings and
had gone to a church whist party that t?  So I went straight to bed.
But I was woken just 'j"6fore midnight .. ."  Elinor's eyes closed. She
could almost.  hear the slow, ponderous stumbling as Billy pulled
himself up the stairs, and the high-pitched, unearthly sound that had
wakened her.  She had leapt from her bed and run to the landing.  A
dishevelled Billy stood halfway up the stairs.  His right hand clutched
the fluffy white nursery cat by its hind legs; it was the cat's
anguished, terrified howls that had roused Elinor.  Billy's other hand
was stretched out to Annabel, who stood frozen in fright only a few
steps above him.

Annabel said quietly, "Yes, I remember.  Daddy Billy was tormenting
Snowball.  And you pulled me away and told me to go back to bed and
stay there.  I heard noises, but I was too frightened to leave my bed
again."

"That's what I wanted," Elinor said.

"What happened next was my secret and I thought that if no one ever
knew about it, then it wouldn't be true, that it never really happened,
you see.

"But it did happen, of course.  Ag soon as Annabel was gone, I grabbed
the cat from Bit,y's hand.  As I did, he reached out, clutching at me.
His hand caught in the lace on my nightgown, and he pulled me towards
him.  I smelled brandy on his breath.  I felt his anger, his
belligerence; I knew in that moment that I had to be free of him.  I
couldn't live with his lies and my disgust and the fear always the
fear. Fear that he would hurt you girls.  Fear that others would know
the truth.  And perhaps the worst fear was that he would be taken away
from me and imprisoned.

"In that moment, I made up my mind.  With all my strength, I pushed him
away from me, down the stairs.  The lace on.  my nightgown tore as he
fell backwards, but he didn't manage to pull me with him.  I watched as
he stumbled and grasped for a hold but missed it.  I watched his
bloodshot eyes as they opened wide with the realization that I wanted
him to die.  For a moment, I almost felt sorry for him.  For a moment,
I thought of the wonderful man I had fallen in love with, and regretted
what I had done.  But it was too late."  Elinor paused once more,
remembering how Billy had crashed downstairs, turned a final half
somersault then landed on his b--k, his eyes closed.

She shook her head sadly.

"I had seen plenty of dead men; I was sure he was dead.  I didn't want
to touch him.  I decided that the sensible thing to do was to leave him
lying in the hall.  I remember that my mind was very clear, that for
once in my life I felt completely in control.  I decided to forget
reality and rewrite the entire scene in my mind, then memorize it
according to my new script, hoping that in time it would be the only
version I'd remember."  Elinor recalled that she had stared at Billy
and felt relief, fresh as a sea breeze playing around her head.  She
had drawn a deep breath and allowed herself the luxury of her true
feelings; for just a few moments, she allowed herself to hate Billy for
what he had done to their marriage ... Miranda leaned back in her
chair- and shook her head, still trying to understand why it was so
important for them all to hear this story.  Puzzled, she asked, "So you
just went back to bed?"  Elinor shook her head again and said with
difficulty, "No.  As I looked at Billy ... his eyelids slowly opened."
Once again she forced herself to remember the terror she had felt as
Billy's pouchy, red-veined eyes glared maliciously at her.  "Just you
wait," he croaked, and then started to vomit.  As she stared down at
him, Elinor, homified, also thought of the many times she had had to
clean up Billy's mess before someone else saw it.  She remembered the
many times she had dutifully tended him and served him.

And for one bewildering moment, Billy's malicious stare fraged her of
something else, something buried, a memory she had thought long
forgotten. Her as if a storm were raging inside it, whirling her
theughts around like fluttering and panicking birds.  For as s eyes
stared up at her, Elinor felt again the total "Billy"

"despair and helplessness she had felt when her father looked at her
with the same contemptuous malevolence.

Violent rage.  suddenly consumed her.  She wanted to howl to primitive
gods, for she felt cheated: she had grasped at release, she had acted
in vengeance, she had been granted her freedom but now it was being
snatched back ... "What did you do, GranT Miranda persisted.

Elinor started, blinked, and looked in a dazed way at the four faces
around the kitchen table.  She said quietly, "I ran upstairs and
grabbed a pillow from my bed.  Then I rushed downstairs and ... I held
it over Billy's face."  The pillow had hidden Billy's angry eyes as he
heaved in protest.  When his body started to jerk and writhe in its
final struggle, Elinor called on a reserve of strength she had never
known she possessed, holding the pillow over his face with the entire
weight of her body.  Gradually Billy heaved less, until only his arms,
protruding beyond the pillow, twitched occasionally.  Eventually all
movement ceased.

Elinor said, "I don't know how long I stayed that way.  I remember I
didn't remove the pillow until the grandfather clock struck one."  She
had stood up wearily, her body suddenly drained of all strength, and
looked with distaste at the vomit-smeared pillowcase.  She removed it
from the pillow; she would have to wash it.  She felt perfectly calm.

Clare's kitchen was completely still as the women sat in stunned
silence.

Finally Elinor spoke again.

"I was terrified that Annabel might have heard something, might even
have seen me ... do it."

"No," Annabel said, "I saw nothing.  I just remember that 6oo 6oi
yowbrought Snowball up to my bedroom, and the gardener took him to the
vet the next morning."

"After I put Snowball in your bed, I stayed until you fell asleep,"
Elinor'said.

"Luckily, Buzz hadn't wakened her bedroom was at the far end of the
house, over the kitchen quarters.  I remember very clearly the calm
with which I sprinkled a bottle of brandy over Billy's body, washed the
pillow, then repaired the tear in my nightgown as best I could.

"I lay in bed, awake nearly all night, terrified of what I had done,
longing to wake Buzz but afraid to involve her in what was ... a
murder."  Elinor looked slowly around the room, her eyes resting
briefly on each face, searching for some reaction.

Clare thought fleetingly of the gil ver-framed photograph at Elinor's
bedside and wondered how, every night, Gran could have slept beside
that smiling face, knowing that she had killed him.  Then Clare
realized suddenly that the bright-eyed young man in that photograph was
the perfect husband Gran chose to remember; her carefully crafted
fantasy had blanked out the debauched, middle-aged drunkard the bully
she had murdered.

Buzz said, "I can't say I'm sorry, Nell.  Billy was a vicious blighter;
he tried to bugger up everything you tried to do for them kids.  In my
view, he died because you had to protect them from him."

"That's what I tell myself," Elinor murmured.

"But I also know that I ... did what I did ... to protect myse6r"

"I still reckon Billy deserved it," Buzz said firmly.

"Poor darling," Annabel said.

"You must have been scared stiff."

"No," Elinor said.

"At first I was too angry to be scared.  I didn't care if they caught
me although, in those days, you were hanged for murder.  Later, of
course, I was frightened, and that fear has never really left me.  I'd
tremble heart would thump every time I saw Sergeant on bicycle up the
drive on what, thank God, always ""'turned out to be some trivial
matter."  She looked at Buzz.

"I longed to talk to you about it.  I never dared.  I was terrified of
telling anyone.  But I've always wondered whether..

Slowly Buzz nodded.

"Yes.  I knew."

"How?"

"I got back fairly early from the church social and was asleep before
eleven, so I woke at six that morning and went downstairs to get a cup
of tea.  I actually found Billy before the maid came downstairs.  And I
saw the one thing you had overlooked a piece of your lace nightgown
still clutched in Billy's hand.  I pried it loose and burned it, so no
one would ever know."  Miranda said urgently, "Why are you telling us
this now, Gran, after keeping your secret for so many years?  As you
once told me, everyone is morally entitled to guard their privacy to
protect themselves."  Elinor looked levelly at her.

"Because I want you all to see and see me acknowledge the danger of
self deception  And perhaps I can only truly admit this to myself, and
absolve myself, by telling you who have seen how destructive it was for
us all.  That and my deference.

"I hope each of you now understands how important it is to trust
yourself and stand up for yourself; I should have done so earlier.  I
should have confronted Billy or left him; I would have managed somehow,
I would have stood on my own two feet but I didn't trust myself to
try."  She looked around the table, then said earnestly, "If, at the
beginning, I'd made it clear to Billy that I wasn't going to put up
with his self-indulgent ill-treatment, then perhaps it wouldn't have
escalated as bad behaviour always does when it's unchecked."

"I know what you mean," Clare said, thinking of Sam.

Buzz said soothingly, "Well, now we all know what "happened, I see no
reason ever to mention it again.  It's all 'in the past."

"The past is always a part of the present," Elinor said.

"And these three must never forget it."  Clare pushed her chair back,
hurried around the table to her grandmother, and.  hugged her.

"I'm proud of you for facing the truth at last."  Earnestly Miranda
said, "I'm proud of you, Gran, because you've always fought and
survived, all your life.  Although you've never believed it, you've
always been capable of looking after yourself.  You never needed anyone
to protect you, Gran you only thought you did."

After a moment, Annabel said hopefully, "And now we've all learned to
stand on our own two feet, haven't weT Miranda sighed.

"It was an expensive experience."  Quietly Elinor said, "All profitable
experience is expensive."

"Not as expensive as the folly of misplaced trust," Clare said.

"Talking of which," Miranda said ruefully, "there's certainly one thing
that we've all learned at last .. ."

"Oh yes."  Clare sent her a wry smile.

"We've finally realized that ..". Daddy doesn't know best."

EPILOGUE

Liberty: freedom from arbitrary or despotic control; the power to do as
one pleases; the power of choice; independence; the quality or state of
being free.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

As always there are many people whom I wish to thank for their kind
help in getting this book before your eyes, and the person to whom I'm
most grateful is my kind and considerate "Mission Control', Nikki Man
waring.

In New York, I much appreciated the hard work of Michael Korda, Chuck
Adams, Jack McKeown, Sandi Gelles-Cole, Victoria Meyer, Frank Metz, and
Sandi Mendelson.  I am also, as always, grateful to my agents, Morton
Janklow and Anne Sibbald.

I must also thank the Laurey Girls Agency, who took so much trouble to
obtain temporary typists who could read my handwriting in particular I
appreciated the charm and ability of Maria Dubow, Ronald Colon, who
provided the typewriters, and Anthony J. Barbaro for his banking
expertise.

I am also grateful to Judy Licht, Paul Smirnoff, John Parsons, Judy
Tygard, Christine Tomlinson, Bob O'Brien."  Carol Ann Sullivan, and
Catherine O'Shea of TV Channel 5.

In Los Angeles I must thank Bill Haber, Joanne Brough and Judy
Hilsinger; in Canada, Richard Pearce.

In Britain, as always I am grateful for the patience, understanding,
and cheerful support of my British publishers, William Armstrong and
Peter Carson, as well as George Sharp and Jacqueline Graham-Pelham; I
would also like to thank Debbie Gill, Jenny Page and Dido Armstrong for
their help.  In Monaco, I would like Nikki Man waring, Nicole Proetta
and Kristina Gonzales de Linares to know how much I appreciated their
organization, typing, enthusiasm, attention to detail and general
support.  I am also very grateful to Roselyn Haudberg, Jane Dubuisson,
Suzanne Proetta, Mary George, Paula Whittam, Eva Cleydon, and Diego
Gonzales de Linares for their help in producing the manuscript.

I was lucky enough to have the final manuscript read and criticized by
Geraldine Cooke, Pete Williams and Dr.  Georges Sandulescu.

I must also thank Maurice Baird Smith, who taught Miranda to fly, and
Gill Brooks of the Cannes Flying School; Ariane Davies-Gilbert, who
gave Elinor her Elizabethan candied flower recipe; Elizabeth Barker,
who was Miranda's stockbroker; Wendy Williams, who designed the garden
at Starlings; Ian Melrose, who advised Mike on his motorbikes;
Alexander Plunket Greene, who gambled with Adam, and Annie Trehearne,
who advised Miranda on fashion and publicity.

For professional advice on legal matters, I am indebted to Sir Patrick
Lawrence, Charles Chatwin, John Dewhurst, Charles Doughty and William
Easun.  For advice on accounting and finance I am grateful to Richard
MacLellan, Stephen Ainsworth and Peter Alexander; for advice on Lloyd's
I am grateful to David Larner; for advice on business procedure I was
lucky enough to be helped by Jennifer dAbo and Jonathan Bevan.

For advice on fraud, I much appreciated the advice, sagacity, and wit
of Walter Wally White of the Fraud Squad.  For medical information I am
grateful to Dr.  John Cardwell, Dr.  Dennis Friedman, Dr.  Jonathan
Gould, Dr.  Margaret Reinhardt and Marion Symes.

For technical information on the First World War including advice on
nurses" underwear I am most grateful to Malcolm.  Brown, as well as the
Imperial War Museum and the RAF Museum at Hendon.  I am also grateful
to Tvor Williams and John Bryant of the League Against Cruel Sports and
Nick Symes for his musical advice.

Others who have helped are Sharon Flynn of Rank Xerox, Diane Kane of
British Airways, Claude Laughier and Geoff Osman.

As always, I am indebted to my son Sebastian Conran for esoteric
information on such subjects as old motor coaches and atom bombs,
vintage motorbikes and Hong Kong massage parlours; and to my son Jasper
Conran for fashion advice, criticism and moral support.

Finally I would like also to thank Isabel Carr, Julia de Biere,
Elizabeth Chatwin and Patrick Scale for their advice and encouragement.
I would also like particularly -to thank Bettina Culham who typed my
first novel and Vanessa Gayle who typed my second novel, who have kept
an eye on me ever since.